Applying your new skills

Congratulations on completing the course!

In truth, however, this is just the beginning.

The ability to read early modern handwriting is a skill that continues to develop with practice and persistence. But now you have the basics in place to confidently grapple with unfamiliar texts.

We hope that you will employ these skills by searching out your family histories, exploring the history of your local community, or by contributing to other important history projects.

This course was produced by the Scottish Religious Cultures Network, with co-operation from the National Records of Scotland, with the intention of preparing people to delve into Scotland’s rich historical collections.

More than this, we want to begin the exciting process of making these records more readily available to the wider public. It is our aim to begin a crowdsourcing transcription of the kirk session records of Govan Old in 2019. We would welcome your participation. So if you have enjoyed this course and would like to continue working with these sources, we would invite you to keep an eye on the University of Glasgow Scottish Religious Cultures Network website for further information.

In any case, continue to use your new skills and keep practising. Your ability to read these sources will only get better the more you use them.

Get extra benefits, upgrade your course

You can now get extra benefits by upgrading this course, including:

Unlimited access to the course: Go at your own pace with unlimited access to the course for as long as it exists on FutureLearn.

A Certificate of Achievement or Statement of Participation: To help you demonstrate your learning we’ll send you a Certificate of Achievement or Statement of Participation when you become eligible.

Find out more