Henry is allowed to take one extra college class per semester for no additional cost—but if you want to take the Extra Class, you can’t sign up for it until everyone else has completed their own normal course registration, which is fair. It’s extra, so there is no pressure to meet a requirement; and in fact, you are encouraged to take something outside your major. (Henry is currently an English major, likely planning to combine it with a teaching degree.) His college offers a class about COWS, and he’d wanted to take that, but it was full; he’d thought about taking Art History or Intro to Music, but both of those are common ways to satisfy the arts requirement so they were all full. (This is one of the primary difficulties of taking the Extra Class: sometimes there are no good classes left.)
He asked all the people in our house (all seven of us are here right now) what college courses we’d taken that we’d recommend. I mentioned a class I’d taken on English words from Latin and Greek Roots; I really liked it, but I think that was in large part because I liked the professor and the way he taught—and because I’d already had several years of Latin, so it was super easy for me. I took a class on Chinese culture because it was the only one that fit in my schedule, and that one was similarly a success, again because of the professor. I found my psychology classes fun; I had to take Into to Psychology to meet the core requirement, and then I took another psychology class that all the business majors had to take; I don’t remember what it was called, but it was sort of a marketing/psychology crossover and it was pretty fun. I liked Probability & Statistics a lot more than I’d thought I would; I liked Intro to Political Science a lot more than I’d thought I would. But I don’t know that I would have taken either of those as extras.
Henry’s siblings recommended any film/music appreciation classes, or any history/culture-of-a-particular-country (whether or not you THINK you are interested in that country) classes. Rob recommended taking an introduction to computer programming class, not so much for the actual coding skills but for learning that way of thinking about things. Elizabeth recommended taking one of the hands-on art classes, especially because those tend to be pass/fail at the early levels, and this is an extra class so it’s nice to have the freedom to let it be the lower priority. I overheard Edward recommending a class on TEXTILES, which is not a class I knew existed, or perhaps I misheard.
Immediately I wanted to ask YOU. What classes do you particularly remember from your school years? What classes did you like more than you thought you would? What classes do you think you would you like to take, if you could take one for no (additional) cost? What classes do you think would be VALUABLE to take, as a not-your-major add-on?
And/or, if this question is more fun: which classes did you THINK you would like, but they TANKED? I started college wanting to be an English teacher, and my first English literature class was so boring and awful I switched majors (ODE TO A GRECIAN URN: NO THANK YOU FOREVER). I took a Philosophy of Friendship class with a professor I’d loved for Intro to Philosophy, and the class was tedious, plodding, pretentious, forced.
I wholeheartedly concur with the Art History recommendation. It has enhanced my understanding of culture, politics, and made every museum visit in my life (voluntary or not) so much more enjoyable. Honestly, so unexpectedly practical!
I am thrilled to hear he is majoring in English. We need more humanities scholars who see stories in the world and understand the human condition. Yay!
I took 3 classes during two different summers, needing to make up credits after disastrous regular semesters. One was on the main campus I usually attended and two were at the satellite campus in my hometown. Only one was taught by a conventional tenured professor. All 3 ended up among my very favorites: comparative religion, taught by a local Episcopalian minister; sociology 101, taught by a grad student; and comparative politics, which was in my major.
Comparative religion had been recommended by my AP English teacher, and easily had the biggest impact on my life. For the final project we had to attend services or interview representatives of 3 different faith traditions. I spoke to a Catholic priest and a leader in the Jewish community, then went to a Unitarian Universalist service, which blew my dang mind. There *were* hippies, activists, feminists, vegetarians, and queers in the Southern metro area I grew up in; I just hadn’t known where they were. Even before I walked in the door, the bumper stickers in the parking lot let me know I was in the right place. It took many years, but eventually I returned to that UU community and got very involved in it.
I took a religious studies class and also attended (and wrote a paper on) a UU service for my final project! The class wasn’t my favorite, but I really enjoyed the service.
Awesome!!!
As an English major (who very much uses the degree every day) I took a Medical Anthropology class that was absolutely fascinating. Also a Comparative Literature class that actually provided a slightly different way of thinking about literature and was very cool.
When I was looking at graduate schools, Cornell had a bongo drum class and that had a cathartic feeling to my over-scheduled engineering undergrad self. I ended up at UC Berkeley though and took a class called Structural Reliability which *sounded* important to a structural engineer but turned out to be an advanced probability and statistics class that I nearly failed.
I am taking Henry’s interest in the course on cows as an indication that he would like to know more random facts about something seemingly mundane, and if he searches the course catalog there might be something else along those lines just waiting (History of Canada! Biology of Fishes! Sociology of National Parks!)
If that’s not actually what he wants, he should think about what he does want – a class where he is likely to meet and get to know interesting people? Get his mind bent a little by a whole different way of understanding the world? Get to see if he is any good at something he has not previously tried?
To answer the second part of the question, I took a State Politics course. It was interesting and fun and I highly recommend knowing more than the bare minimum about how politics works in your home state (or any state). But then I tried to take Politics of Railroads and didn’t like the professor and ended up dropping it.
My college had a class on the culture and history of surfing! I never took it but I was always intrigued by the concept.
Oooh what a fun post.
I majored in engineering. One summer I picked up a community college class: History of Film. It was cool to learn about early film technology. We watched a movie every week. I am not a huge movie person, like at all, so this exposed me to some classics I otherwise never would have watched.
To finish this required history sequence I also did history of criminology or something like that. Interesting and easy, but I don’t remember much this *cough* many years later.
My bonus extra class was in my otherwise light load last semester: ballet. Intro, of course. I wanted to love it, but unfortunately far too many students in the class had actual years of training, (and must have found it dull), so I felt a bit out of place. I wonder if it was actually challenging for the teacher to have this incredible range?? (However I did go on to take a good number of years of adult classes!)
I took a class called Geography of Food in undergrad. I thought it would be a fun way to learn about different international cuisines, but it was more about the ethics of the agriculture industry. It was interesting and informative and I’m glad I took it! But it was also a bummer. (One time the professor’s husband came in to do a guest lecture about different types of beer from around the world, and the professor cheerfully told us that it would be the only lecture this semester that wouldn’t make us feel bad.)
I was a theatre major, so I took a lot of theatre classes, but I especially loved musical theatre — I think I took it three times. I also really enjoyed theatre tech. We had the choice to focus on costumes, lighting, or scenery. I wanted to do costumes but it was either full or incompatible with my schedule, so I did scenery and absolutely loved it. And I took a Shakespeare class I loved so much that I went on to write two masters’ theses on Shakespeare.
Zoology was really cool and interesting! There was an optional one-unit lab that went along with it, and I got to touch an octopus one time. And we got to go on field trips to the aquarium and the zoo!
I thought I’d like astronomy, but it turns out that I am not naturally adept at that type of science.
I’m currently working on my paralegal certificate at a community college (mostly because it’s necessary to get promoted at my job), and I’m finding it a lot more interesting than expected. I thought law classes would be boring and dry, and they sometimes are, but mostly they give me a lot to think about and I find them challenging in a good way. (I especially enjoyed the electives I took this past summer: one on intellectual property law and one on trials and evidence.) Plus, I think a working knowledge of the US legal system is very valuable in These Current Times.
Oh, and RE: the textiles class — my mom MAJORED in textiles. Or Home Ec with an emphasis in textiles, if I recall correctly. I’m not sure if any colleges even offer Home Ec as a major anymore, but I bet some of the classes are/were pretty fun.
Art history would be my pick. If he enjoys watching movies, I would strongly advise against anything cinematic. Once you’ve learned to spot continuity mistakes you won’t be able to just enjoy a movie as easily as before.
I thought taking Astronomy 101 would be fun and easy – my college had a nice telescope on top of the science building – but it turned out to involve a lot of polar coordinates and rotational geometry and I withdrew so I wouldn’t have a D on my transcript. Turns out they had visitors’ hours to look through the telescope. I also took Literature of the Fantastic which I really liked. I learned a lot about the reasons different cultures have certain fairy tales, although I can’t for the life of me remember what we actually read.
My senior year, I took a fascinating class on the history of cigarette advertising. It was honestly the best class I took in college.
I took a class on the Menominee culture and language my Freshman year. It was in WI and that is a Native American tribe located in the state. It was amazing. It was taught by one of the elders in the tribe, who must have been in his 70’s. He grew up speaking the language and he didn’t want it to die out. Each class was basically him talking about his childhood and the culture of his people, and learning a few words. I still can say hello and how are you, 30 years later. :) It was very informal and interesting and fun, and I consider it one of the best classes I ever took. It’s the epitome of what a liberal arts education should be to me—I learned so much about another culture, and myself.
I was also an English major with a minor in education! Then I did my student teaching, and…no thanks. I took a ballroom dancing class that I still remember fondly. It has come in handy more than once!
I was an engineering major with a packed schedule. In my school we did not get many electives to choose outside the required calculus/physics/chemistry courses of the major and one theology and one philosophy course required by the university. I took Creative Writing for one of the very few elective spots left. It was such a delight to exercise a whole different part of my brain. Hours of formulas and labs and that gridded green engineering paper and then just….writing about yourself as an inanimate object or write about a conflict for two characters or write after reading this passage? It was such a fun change!
I took Educational Psychology and it was AWFUL. This was perhaps partially my fault because I was a psychology major and I had taken all the rest of the psychology classes already and I thought “why not”. But it was a shared class between the psychology and the education department and it ended up being a very low level class taught by someone who was very interested in teaching and she made us do group work on every single assignment and I was so bored I thought I would die because then at least I would have something to do.
I took a class on meditation and it was very fun. It was a single hour class so it met for sixteen hours over one weekend and the teacher basically had us all lying on the floor the entire time meditating. Lovely. I also took a children’s lit class called “Beyond Harry Potter: Exploring Classical Children’s Fantasy Literature” and I found some lovely books in that class that I still read occasionally. (Eva Ibbotson! Shelagh Jones!) I also took a pottery class once that was a delight.
I went to college excited to sign up for philosophy, 101. I went to my first class and found my classmates and their opinions so insufferable that I ended up immediately dropping it.
Like someone said above, I recommend anthropology classes. Before I went to college, I did not even know it existed as a field. After sticking my toes in, I ended up minoring in it. My educational journey took an unexpected trajectory, and I was a political science major undergraduate, and then went back to school for a masters in nutrition and public health. To this day, I bring concepts from anthropology and book recommendations to my coworkers. Two classes I took that I think would be a great complements to almost any field of study were anthropology of child rearing and medical anthropology.
Oooh! Love this question!
I was an engineering major and I took human physiology for non-biology majors, and also a similar geography class for non-science majors and those were both GREAT. I learned so much in the human phys class that I still think of today! So I recommend an intense sounding class for NON majors, and it’ll be super basic and so interesting.
I loved my intro to linguistics- the case studies were fascinating. I took a public policy class that a made me wish I had discovered the topic earlier to major in (I have an economics degree). My favorite econ class focused on labor laws. I loved my electives: art history, a music class on Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms, a religion class, and women’s studies (an eye opener in the early 90s). Yay electives! My Russian lit class was a bit of a slog.
I took a Dinosaur class that I loved! The professor was very aware that everyone was just there to have fun, and while we learned a lot of the science of paleontology, we also watched a lot of clips from various tv shows/movies with dinosaurs and discussed as a class what the portrayal got wrong.
My advice to Henry would be to go on Rate My Professor or the college’s reddit page and find who the best professors are. Then take a class by one of them. The teacher makes or breaks the class, and a good teacher will be engaging no matter the subject. Hope he has fun with it!
This, exactly! The professors are the reason we remember the classes we do and even the best subject can be ruined by a bad professor while a great professor can make almost anything interesting! Kids these days (ha!) are so lucky to have “rate my professors” to check before they sign up. Though I do tell my college-age daughter to read the reviews carefully. Hopefully your son will find a few things he’s interested in, Swistle, and can look for the best professor!
So many good ideas!
I took an “extra” class on Marriage, offered by the religion department of a Catholic University associated with my University. Despite not being Catholic myself, it was a great class and helped me think about IF I wanted to be married and WHAT I wanted from marriage and HOW to have a good marriage. Eye-opening stuff, when you are only 19.
My daughter’s school offers a history class on Pirates which sounds like an interesting time but her schedule is too full. But there are some niche history topics that might be fun to explore.
I’d look at the history department; sometimes they’ll offer a niche History of ___ type of course. I second both the state politics class (one of my favorites as an undergrad political science major) and the world religions class.
I’m not even sure they offer this class anymore, but I took a Business Writing class that was so helpful. We learned how to format letters and memos which is Ancient Knowledge now, but we also learned how to write to someone and get what you want–complaints, requests for information, executive summaries, etc. I found it immensely useful.
I took a geography of food class that was surprisingly super interesting in college, but as many have noted that may have just been about a great professor. My same-age-as-Henry daughter just took an Astronomy class and it was amazing, included multiple planetarium and star gazing sessions with super cool telescopes, but it was a TON of work and math for my humanities oriented kid. Similar to Elizabeth’s art suggestion, classes in the PE department are usually low-stress, fun, and ensure some exercise in your schedule – yoga, swimming, tennis, and of course the classic “college bowling.”
I took a Religions of the World intro level class to fill some requirement. I’d been brought up Lutheran but was not at all “religious.” It is probably the only class I still think about at times today.
What a cool opportunity! I adore history, and probably took enough extra history classes to almost earn myself a history minor just for the fun of it. I also love looking at maps so would have loved a geography class. I also always wished I had taken an intro to logic or philosophy class, because it was never a requirement for me. Intro to marketing is interesting because it teaches you all the way that companies try to trick you into buying things you don’t want. Film is also fun if you’re a movie buff.
Does he listen to podcasts? What kind is he drawn to? What are his interests? Science? Entertainment? People? Ideas? Trivia? He could even take something like bowling or weightlifting.
I was an engineering major and my favorite classes in college were about Primate Behavior. They were cross-referenced between the biology and women’s studies departments! We studied non-human primate behavior and ecology. Hearing about my female professor’s research on lemurs in Madagasca was endlessly fascinating. I loved the first class so much I had to take another one from her even though it did not count towards my degree. I also took an art history class, but essay writing has always been painful for me so that class was a bit tedious.
Are PE classes offered? Back in the 1900s when I was in college, we were required to take 4 credits of PE. I am the least athletic person around so please don’t mistake this for me being an AVID sports person. I did Badminton, Bowling, Gymnastics and Self-Defense and I completely enjoyed all of them! Maybe it would be a nice physical/mental break to do something like that?
I took a class called Career Development, a Pyschology class, when I was at my first community college. I’ve since learned everyone has to take it at a school that only provides associate degrees. It was really great, in an exploratory way. I took two semesters of American Politics Through Film and Fiction and it exposed me to so many things, The Handmaids Tale when it was a new novel, Eyes on the Prize, it was great. I also loved to take PE classes through school, it was pretty cheap at 1 credit hour and it kind of made me try new things. I’m about to date myself when I say one of those new things was STEP AEROBICS haha!
I was absolutely fascinated by any anthropology and sociology classes I was able to cram into my schedule. An anthro class that was probably my favorite class ever was called City and Human Health- it traced the development of cities along with the spread of diseases. I also really remember loving Sociology of Families. I would really encourage him to check out the course catalog and find something that just appeals to him.
And definitely see if he can fit that Cow Class in somewhere, it sounds amazing!
I took a class on Weather and the Science of the Atmosphere, found it much more interesting than I would have thought! (My mom still won’t listen to me about chemtrails lol).
I went to college 2000-2005 and the registration process was so cutthroat, there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth when you couldn’t get something you NEEDED TO GRADUATE omg. I actually changed my major because the things I needed were not available.
I really enjoyed the Philosophy of Knowledge courses I had to do, and also classes that went deep into a very particular thing (like the Cows course but for a specific country). Natural Hazards and Disasters courses are good (and were very popular as an outside option when I taught in College). I took a theology/drama (joint listed) course on the search for peace in theatre and really loved it.
I took a Development Economics course as an undergrad (it was compulsory to do something outside your major) and I was really disappointed: neither fully science-y, maths-y or sociology.
Other than art history classes, my favorite undergrad class was Geology of the National Parks. I remember seeing a picture of the Tetons and thinking “I HAVE TO GO THERE” and when I finally did it was so delightful.
I heard great things about Children’s Literature. I was pretty excited, lots of sections/teachers/times available too. Picked one that worked. Arrived, all anxious to revisit with Ramona, Anne, Frances, all my old friends. Then the instructor announced, we’ll focus on Children of The Bible this semester. Ugh, sorry but boring and yes, I stuck it out. Dreadful. Tanked. Regret not switching sections.
I also was an English major for awhile. I was so excited to take Shakespeare I. But not only was my recent ex-boyfriend somehow in the same section, it was taught from a theatrical lens. I did not care about staging and casting, but I did care about my ex, so I dropped the course and all was (mostly) well.
The English class that I wasn’t sure I would like but it turned out to be great was The Bible as Literature. We read and compared the Christian Bible with other religious texts from around the world. It was fascinating and not a religion course by any means.
I knew I would love Children’s Literature and it was everything I thought it would be and more! Old childhood favorites, modern best sellers, and new-to-me international stories. If he can tell ahead of time what the books will be, then I would recommend taking this course or a similar one.
I took a fabulous history class on Myths, Mysteries, and Frauds as an undergrad, and it was so fascinating. Everything was fun, interesting, and I loved every minute of it.
Two classes immediately came to mind — a theater make up class and a folk dancing class. I loved both of them and neither of them were for my major. A class I took for my major (communications with a media production emphasis) was a rhetoric class. I don’t remember why. It must have fulfilled some requirement and was the interesting option available. I was surprised by how much I liked it.
I took a Psychology course called The Nature of Human Consciousness. It was fascinating, enough that I took Cognition with the same professor the next year. Thinking about thinking, for the over thinker in your life!
I took Ceramics I & II and enjoyed it, I still have my slightly mishapen coffee mugs I threw in 1992. If they ever break I will cry.
I would go for the class with the best professor – are professor evals still available to students these days? At my college you could log in and see anonymized evaluations and ratings.
If he’s looking for something USEFUL – intro statistics probably has my vote. Or…is there a way to get ahead in his major? (Offer to split the savings with him if he graduates a semester early!)
Interesting/fun – an intro course in a new foreign language could be fun. They often contain some cultural elements which is cool. My mind was kind of blown the first time I studied a non-Indoeuropean language – it made me realize how much of my thinking is shaped by being a native english speaker.
If his college is in or near a city – they may have some kind of urban studies or local history class where most of the assignments involve going off campus and exploring. I forget what year he is, but as a freshman especially I think it can be helpful to remember that there is life outside the college bubble. I just pulled up my college’s academic catalog and found a class where the first sentence of description is “This course is based on bicycling through the neighborhoods surrounding the [name of college].” Exercise plus exploring? Amazing.
I have nothing to add, but am finding this discussion fascinating, as a person who studied outside the North American system!
I did my undergraduate degree in three years, so did nothing that was not part of my subject or as you would say, Major. There was no time for anything fun or even slightly off path.
I feel cheated!
Halfway through my university program I took a look at the courses needed for my major and realized I was going to have basically no room for fun extra courses, so I decided to take an extra semester. Excellent decision, no regrets. Of course I was lucky to be in a position where that was logistically and financially possible.
(Well, one regret, in that my last term ended up being a summer term and several of the fun courses I was considering weren’t available then. If I’d realized in advance, I would have taken those courses earlier and saved some of the required ones for summer term. Oh well.)
I took an introductory course on Greek mythology in university, very fun, partly for the fun subject matter and partly because I already knew a lot of the Greek myths so it was super easy.
For the second question, I wanted to take a course on food/cooking in my last term but it wasn’t available so I ended up in a cognitive science course, which was pretty interesting but less hard-science than i’d hoped (mostly because a lot of the brain is still just a mystery).
I still think very fondly of the History of Cinema class I took in college. We watched so many different movies and I liked learning about how shots are put together. I also took a ceramics class which was very fun even though I was bad at it. Oh, and I took a class that focused on Shakespeare’s tragedies which was really good, but if Edward is an English major he’s probably got that covered.
Classes I hated: had a truly terrible computer programming class, mostly because the professor sucked. I did not love the Intro to Sociology class I tried although I feel like I would appreciate it more now.
Class I wish I had taken: basic statistics, which really should have been required for my major but was not.
I had to take a 400-level Evolution course to get my biology BSc – we could specialize in an area (I chose molecular biology) but everyone had to take a few core courses, Evolution was one of them. I waited until my very last semester because the evolution sections in all of my lower level courses were SO BORING. But this class was AMAZING. Not at all what I expected, the prof and TA were amazing and I learned SO much.
As a fun activity sometimes, I would browse all the course listings across campus and dream of taking just a random course out of nowhere, unrelated to my degree. I always wished I’d taken a Logic & Reasoning philosophy class, or a World Religions type of class. Or one of the cool archaeology classes, like “ARCH 226 – Shamans, Sacrifice and Psychedelics”.
Oooh, or there were so many interesting sounding Humanities courses: Great Cities in Their Time; Daily Life in Ancient Greece and Rome; Heroic Archetypes: From the Trojans to Frankenstein; Classical Mythology. Oh, and I sat in on a Marketing lecture once for a class my roommate was taking – it was really neat.
I should just go take a random class now. I work at a university!
Oh fun! I fondly remember a class on the history of the Vietnam War- I took it over the summer, so there were limited options and I think I was trying to check a history box? But I actually loved it and enjoyed getting to deep dive on a single topic. Felt very different from the really broad history classes I took in high school.
I also fulfilled my science requirement with some sort of Rocks for Jocks geology class, but I really enjoyed it- learned a lot about plate tectonics (there must have been other subjects over the semester but they are lost to time.)
Oh fun!!! I was a Kinesiology major (English minor) and took some super fun classes like Olympics: Ancient and Modern – which comes in surprisingly helpful at trivia nights. I also took a seminar class on Genetics and Drugs in sports which is now 20 years out of date on trans athletes, doping etc but was very open, inclusive and the science falls on the side of supporting trans athletes.
A basic anatomy/physiology class is a great baseline for knowing about your own body without getting too intensely science/lab-y.
I’d also support a computer science or cognitive systems class too.
The two classes I still remember many years later were Asian History, which focused on China, Japan and India, none of which I’d had any exposure to in my many European History courses, and Letters of Paul, which analyzed Paul’s letters in the bible as literature rather than religion. It was fascinating. I was an English major too, and I still use those skills many (many) years later.
The university I went to has a whole major for textiles (technically Textiles, Fashion Merchandising, and Design) and some of the classes sounded super interesting but I never took any. My favorite fun class was Intro to Small Boats and it was literally how to handle small boats. I also took a cool class on Asian calligraphy. I’m going to disagree with others on Art History; I hated that class.
As an Anthropology major (followed by an Education major), I absolutely second Rob’s recommendation to take a class in something like computer programming because as a teacher it is SO useful to understand different ways of thinking!
From my university classes (mostly at a Dutch university but one year at NYU) I mostly remember the ones taught by inspiring professors, like Politics of International Relations – super boring topic, but I really enjoyed it because of how it was taught.
Classes I enjoyed because of the topic were Drugs, Politics and Culture (fascinating mostly because of my American classmates’ attitude towards Pharmaceuticals), Religion and Terrorism, and a class on Genocide. None of them light topics, but they still give me food for thought and it’s been 20 years since I graduated!
Art history. Meteorology. Anything in the social work realm would be helpful for a future educator!
Intro to Linguistics or a languages of the world course! Interesting material and novel ways of thinking about how humans encode ideas
I was an English major too! My favorite other classes were intro psych, intro Russian, and a class on wildlife physiological ecology (this one required some bio prereqs, though). A random language class might be fun if Henry is into language generally.
As a science major, I relished classes in arts and humanities – refreshing change from lab reports. Some
of my favorite were Film Appreciation, Greek Mu Mythology, Religions of Asia, and Art History. Also classes
that were informative about oppression and society got me out of my affluent suburban bubble and should be mandatory, IMHO – Women’s Studies, Sociology, and Race and Gender Topics.
I never went to college, beyond a psychology class at the local community college (I loved it). If I could take a class now, it would be Sign Language. It seems like it would be useful for Henry – you never know when you might use it!
I went completely deaf in my 40s, unexpectedly, and never learned sign language because there were no local places to do so. Now I’m about to turn 62 (with cochlear implants) and I still want to learn it. I’ve done online classes and apps but it’s not the same, I would like to do it in an actual classroom. :)
My favorite “bonus” classes were Philosophy of Mind and Science Fiction and an English class on Science fiction and fantasy. I also took a class on The Altarpiece to satisfy my art requirement despite having no interest in religion or altarpieces, because the professor was deemed to be excellent. And indeed he was and it was a fun class! One of my proudest moments in college was when the TA told me my essay was excellent and asked what my major was, and looked truly shocked when I said “physics.”
History of _______– it’s fun to focus on a subject and not be covering centuries. Children’s Lit–I took this in college, loved it, but it was required for my major. Some art class like Ceramics or watercolor, I am horrible at it but loved it. I would also recommend Intro to Linguistics…that one was fun. Of course as others have said, it can definitely depend on the instructor.
I took a History of American Urbanization to fill a spot on my schedule which was really fun–I was a sophomore and I remember the class was taught by a PhD student and the other students were all senior history majors. The class was really interesting and I remember we would sometimes meet at a cafe or local restaurant and that felt so grown up at the time. The class I took expecting it to be easy was a Meteorology class taught by the local weatherman. I took it as a science requirement for non-science majors and let me tell you, I had to drop it by mid-semester because it was so difficult for me.