Creating a maximally responsive syllabus: Aligning learning outcomes, assignments, and assessment strategies
Our Associate Director of Assessment, Nancy Bostrom, with colleagues from Coe and Grinnell Colleges, facilitated a workshop focused on strategies to build a maximally responsive syllabus. The slides and recording from that workshop are available to you; please note that the first 10 minutes or so of the workshop, which requires a Macalester login, was not recorded (oops!).
Below are resources from the workshop about backward course design and instructional and assessment alignment, as well as additional resources collected by the Serie Center to help you create a (module-based!) syllabus that will be responsive to the complicated contexts of the 2020-2021 year.
Reverse course design / Instructional and assessment alignment
- Template for backward course design
- Worksheet for re-designing your syllabus
- Integrated Course Design, D. Fink (pdf)
- Instructional and Assessment Alignment
Syllabus construction / Communicating course expectations
- How to Create a Syllabus
- How to Turn Your Syllabus into an Infographic
- Inclusive Syllabus Design resources (Lawrence University)
- Course Expectations: Why You Need Them and How to Communicate Them
More on assessment: Contract and specifications grading
Condensing course content for a modular semester
- Recommendations from a current Mac student who attended a mod-system high school
- Short Courses / Part-of-Term Courses: Condensing Course Content
- Sample 8-week course syllabus
- Cornell College Course Syllabi (too condensed, as Cornell’s syllabi are for a 3.5 week block, but they can still offer some useful perspective)
