history or homework?

[Senga 2]

Does anyone actually do their history homework these days? Most of the recent questions I've seen seem to be homework help.

[dundurn]

It does worry me sometimes. Some questioners don't seem even to have the basic internet nous to pick up what's already there. I know there are lots of websites that contain a load of rubbish. When you know as little of a subject as they obviously do, it must be difficult to sort the wheat from the chaff, but for a lot of subjects it's that process of winnowing that is the real foundation of true understanding. Sometimes the questions are of the sort that in my day always ended with the word, discuss. The way they are phrased on this site it sounds as if they think they are trivia that can only have one answer.

[fredpuli47]

Apparently not , and not just with history and school homework One of the questions in law was being asked by someone who I'm certain was doing a degree . The questioner was posing as a hurried , desperate lay person, and had me fooled.. When asked for more detail the questioner gave the game away by saying that a [leading case you'd learn in study] would apparently not apply and by having to say 'I suppose' about a fact which they would know if it were their own personal problem and not an academic one ! Cheek!

[jno]

A useful start with any kind of problem is to try to find someone who knows about it, which is what AB exists for. I don't think that, ethically speaking, seeking an answer here, or elsewhere on the internet, is worse than looking it up in a library. It's not as if anyone has to answer. When someone asks for a history of the world I usually don't bother. If they just ask for a history of the Crusades I might provide a link. If they ask for a history of my street I'll try to answer as fully as I can.

I do wonder at some of the questions, dundurn. Is it no longer permissible to ask your teacher for an initial steer? Perhaps it isn't. Anyway, I'd sooner someone got a sketchy answer from me than remained in ignorance.

[Senga 2]

All interesting thoughts guys, thanks.