Educational Media Reviews Online

This DVD set is correlated to two McGraw Hill textbooks: The Unfinished Nation and American History: A Survey, both by Alan Brinkley, a respected professor of American History. The sets are marketed to distance education programs as well as to traditional face-to-face classroom programs. Additional materials include a study guide published by McGraw Hill, a Faculty Guide with Exam Bank available from INTELECOM and an Online Component available in HTML and WebCT formats. Each of the discs contains four half hour episodes that in turn are subdivided into four seven or eight minute segments. The results of dividing each episode into shorter segments is that they end quite abruptly and frequently lack a transition to the next segment. Fortunately there is also the option of playing the episode as a single event thus eliminating this choppiness in the narrative flow.

The Unfinished Nation is a quintessential survey with the strengths and weakness inherent in such creations. The episodes are crafted with a mix of authentic period drawings, prints, paintings, maps, film clips and reenactments interspersed with commentary from academics. The illustrations are carefully chosen; the commentary is insightful. Given the length of the programs, however, it is impossible for the episodes to provide an in-depth examination of issues.

This series would be a useful resource for those adopting the McGraw Hill textbooks and is appropriate for public school U.S.history classes and lower level survey classes. The Unfinished Nation would not serve as a replacement of those many in-depth series, such as Ken Burns’ Civil War, that are available to educators.