Gen Ed connects the dots of life
Casual critics say college students can spend too much time with their heads in the clouds. John Huth, the Donner Professor of Science in Harvard’s Department of Physics, agrees. To bring undergraduates back to earth, Huth created “Primitive Navigation,” a course that teaches them to use nature’s signposts to get from place to place. Students learn to navigate the campus using the type of sun compass that the Vikings relied on; to calculate distance by measuring their own steps, as the ancient Romans did; and to understand the movement of celestial bodies and the change of seasons in elemental ways. “In this course, students not only learn about science in the classroom, but also by going out and doing things,” Huth said recently. “We took them to the roof of the Science Center and had them identify the major stars. They watched the movement over the course of an hour to...