I took this couse in the winter of 2010 with Berneir.
The quizzes in this course are super easy and right out of the textbook, you just have to flip through and find where the answer is. At times, people were confused about some of the questions asked because the wording was wierd (or maybe they were looking to into it) and I remember 2-3 occasions where I could not find the answer, but overall it was easy. The quizzes are the only part of the course that you need a textbook for. You could try to answer without the textbook but it's harder trying to find the right information online not knowing if the information you find clashes with the texbook (from where the questions are derived). My friend had the textbook and I didn't so we both just used it together to work on the quizzes.
The midterms are straightforward. But, a bit of warning. Bernier, is really good at making MC questions that can confuse you and he will ask the tiniest detail. I did okay in the first midterm and thereafter literally wrote down everything that came out of his mouth and did much better in the second midterm. So, I would recommend that you write everything, no detail is too irrelevant.
From what I remember, the exam was 40 questions in the same style as the midterms. Then, 60 questions were like case study where you read a blurb about a country and then answer 10 questions about it. Although the blurb was useless and you didn't need to read it to answer the questions. We couldn't prepare for this part, it was all new. But it was extremely logical stuff. People only doubted themselves because they had a hard time believeing it was that easy. I do think he gave 1 or 2 case study before hand so you can get a feel for it.
Oh yeah, we had to watch videos, which were interesting but completely ruined by the fact that we had to take notes since they were on the midterm/exam. Course was fairly intersting, albeit, a bit dry.
Overall I would recommend this course to anyone who can memorize. Should be able to get an 11 without too much stress.
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