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A successful course depends on the planning that precedes it. The articles and links in this section serve as planning guides. They provide instructions for creating a syllabus.

Writing a Syllabus

This site includes advice for creating useful, learner-centered syllabi. Resources include a course planning decision guide, a syllabus template, and a rubric to help evaluate a syllabus.

Educators increasingly agree that a learner-centered syllabus is associated with better rapport between students and teachers and increased student motivation, achievement, and empowerment. Accordingly, in 2009 Cullen and Harris developed a rubric for assessing the degree to which a syllabus is learner-centered versus teacher-centered. To date, however, there has been no such resource to explain how to actually construct a learner-centered syllabus. Therefore, I set out to provide a primer: In the first half of this paper, I review the history of syllabus construction and then discuss the research that assesses the impact of learner-centered syllabi. In the second half, I provide an assessment tool for teachers, based on the work of Cullen and Harris, for evaluating a syllabus to determine its learner-centeredness. I then explain specific elements of a learner-centered syllabus and provide examples of how to include these elements in your syllabus.

The authors explore the literature on college syllabi and suggest what information might be included on your syllabus. This resource features an in-depth discussion of the major content areas to consider for a course syllabus.

Constructing a Syllabus: A Handbook for Faculty, Teaching Assistants and Teaching Fellows (Woolcock, 2005

[NOTE: Link to PDF file in folder provided]

Thorough handbook on the topic of course construction, with a special emphasis on preparing a syllabus. Includes practical exercises to help develop your course outline and goals, as well as samples of completed syllabi.