Visually Mapping Course Design for Students: The Graphic Syllabus *

1. Visually Mapping Course Design for Students: The Graphic Syllabus* Jackie Cason, Ph.D. Center for Advancing Faculty Excellence New Faculty Orientation Fall 2006 *Adapted from a pre-conference workshop by Linda B. Nilson, Clemson University, Writing Across the Curriculum Conference, May 2006, and from the UAF Center for Distance Education and Distance Learning Systems based on the work of Grant Wiggins & Jay McTighe, 1998, Understanding by Design.

2. Reflecting on Current Practice What ‘planning process’ do you currently use when developing a course and preparing your syllabus? Take a moment to generate a response. You can jot notes, create a diagram or flowchart, or write a descriptive paragraph. Just capture your current process!

3. Identifying Course Goals • Traditional Process • Curriculum Content Guides http://www.curric.uaa.alaska.edu/curric/courses/ • Previous Syllabi • Backward Design • Enduring Understandings • Essential Questions • Unit Questions and Activities

4. Traditional Process Teach, Test, Hope for the Best

5. Backward Design Stages of the Backward Design Process

6. Why “Backward”? The stages are logical but they go against habits! • We’re used to jumping to lesson and activity ideas first before clarifying our performance goals for students. • By thinking through the assessments upfront, we ensure greater alignment of our goals and means, and ensure that our teaching is focused on desired results.

7. Curricular Priorities Types of Understanding/Bodies of Knowledge

8. Levels of Knowledge It’s worth being familiar with if it…  is really interesting and adds value to lifelong learning.  can be a hook to a big idea or theme. • helps in making links to other ideas or disciplines. It is important to know and do if it…  is key to understanding the subject.  is something one might need to know and do throughout life.  links to enduring understandings. It is an enduring understanding if it…  is at the heart of the discipline.  has value beyond the classroom.  is that aspect of learning that will remain for a lifetime

9. Uncoverage • Instead of Covering Material, Uncover It • Find ways to have students do the material, not just learn it. • Focus on integrated performance, not isolated lessons. • Enduring understandings are subtle and unobvious. • Uncover what is vital and revealing. • What is uncovered is a shorthand for results of inquiries, problems, and arguments, not self-evident fact. • Breadth • Unearth, Analyze, Question, Prove, Generalize • Not the same as coverage • Depth • Connect, Picture, Extend

10. Some Enduring Understandings American History • Individuals and their varied backgrounds contribute to the diversity of American culture and society. • Tensions are inherent in the principles, values, and ideals of American society.

11. Some Enduring Understandings Composition Studies • Communication is contextual and occurs at the intersection of writer, audience, and publication forum. • Genres evolve, and are always evolving, as a matter of practice; therefore, the “rules” of good writing are descriptive rather than prescriptive. • Citation practices in academic writing are the means of joining an ongoing intellectual conversation and a way of contributing new knowledge to that conversation. • Writing styles arise out of a community’s particular ways of knowing and being.

12. Activity:Enduring Understandings Use Worksheet 1

13. Understanding → Questions Understanding Leads to Essential Questions • From Enduring Understandings… • Physics: the nature of gravitational force • History: the subjective aspect of the historical record • Literature: the roles of morals, heroes, and villains in fiction • Communication: the characteristics of sarcasm, irony, and spin • …Create Essential Questions • What is gravity? • Is history objective? Is it a history of progress? • Must fiction involve morality? • Do we always “mean what we say and say what we mean?” • The Essential Questions Endure • Recur throughout the course (and beyond) • Can’t be answered simply… or sometimes at all

14. Essential Questions Essential Questions--Organizational Framework for Units of Instruction • Go to the heart of the discipline—address the philosophical or conceptual foundations of the discipline • Have no obvious “right” answer • Recur naturally throughout one’s learning and in the history of the field/discipline • Raise other important questions, often across disciplinary boundaries • Lead readily to asking research or inquiry questions • Are framed to provoke and sustain student interest

15. Activity:Essential Questions Use Worksheet 2

16. Essential → Unit Questions Essential Questions Lead to Unit Questions • Unit questions inform class activities • Uncover facets of essential understandings • Still not self-evidently true… uncovered • Provoke/sustain student interest • Samples of Unit Questions • Physics: How is gravity related to mass? Explain the basic inverse square proportion (Newton’s Law) • History: How have perceptions of Columbus (and our celebration of Columbus Day) changed? Why? • Literature: Who are the moral centers of Huck Finn? • Communication: Is the Alanis Morrissette song “Ironic” actually ironic? How does it differ in this respect from Mark Antony’s “Brutus is an honorable man?”

17. First Impressions: Course Design and the Graphic Syllabus Now that you have taken the time to design your course with enduring understandings, essential questions, and authentic activities and assessments, how do you communicate that to students?

18. Traditional Definition of a Syllabus The Oxford English Dictionary defines syllabus as “a statement of the subjects covered by a course of instruction or by an examination, in a school, college, etc.; a programme of study” [1889].

19. How Some Students See Your Syllabus and Course Design Organization of Course, BLAH 300: “Something I Gotta Take to Graduate” • Week 1: Overview of Orienteering through Obstacles • Week 2: From Compasses to GPS Technology • Week 3: Hiking Boots and Knot Tying • Week 4: Cont’—Untying Knots • Week 5: Encountering Wildlife I: Bears and Beavers • Week 6: Encountering Wildlife II: Moose and Waterfowl • Week 7: Fur Rendezvous • Week 8: How to Cure a Hangover and Prevent Pregnancy • Week 9: Cabin Fever and S.A.D.

20. Four Functions of a Syllabus • A contract • A communication device • A plan of action • A cognitive map

21. A Contract The syllabus is an important legal document that represents an agreement between you and your students. Consider seriously the policies you want to enforce.

22. A Communication Device The syllabus provides the opportunity to anticipate and respond to student questions and to establish a tone for the course.

23. A Plan of Action The syllabus should represent the overall plan of action for the semester • Course mission http://curric.uaa.alaska.edu/curric/courses/ • Educational philosophy • Course strategy • Course goals

24. Handout:Syllabus ChecklistCAS Template Checklist

25. A Cognitive Map Because students need to engage actively in creating their own cognitive maps, you can facilitate active learning by modeling the mapping process.

26. What is a Graphic Syllabus? Definition: • A flow chart, diagram, or topical organization of the course that complements the printed syllabus.

27. Benefits of a Graphic Syllabus • Appeals to nonverbal learning styles • Models a learning tool by encouraging students to map course concepts • Reinforces memory • Offers the big picture without being over-laden with language • Forces us to tighten our own course organization and to clarify the enduring understandings and essential questions as well as the relationships among various units of instruction • Releases faculty creativity in course design

28. Examples See handouts with examples of graphic syllabi: • Social Stratification • Conservation Biology • Public Science Writing

29. Variations in Graphic Syllabi • Shape, Shading, and Color of key enclosures, activities, assignments, etc. • Shape, Shading, and Color of Connecting lines • Type size, face, features (bold, italics) • Graphic metaphors or symbols

30. Case Method Teaching Application SL PBL Simulations Verbal & Visual Variations Verbal: “When properly implemented, the case method, problem-based learning, (PBL), service-learning (SL), and simulations all teach students how to apply course material.” Visual:

31. Case Method PBL • SL Simulations Teach Applications Verbal & Visual Variations Verbal: “When properly implemented, the case method, problem-based learning, (PBL), service-learning (SL), and simulations all teach students how to apply course material.” Visual:

32. Case Method SL Teach Application PBL Simulations Verbal & Visual Variations Verbal: “When properly implemented, the case method, problem-based learning, (PBL), service-learning (SL), and simulations all teach students how to apply course material.” Visual:

33. Case Method PBL SL Simulations Teach Application Verbal & Visual Variations Verbal: “When properly implemented, the case method, problem-based learning, (PBL), service-learning (SL), and simulations all teach students how to apply course material.” Visual:

34. Teach Application Case Method PBL SL Simulations Verbal & Visual Variations Verbal: “When properly implemented, the case method, problem-based learning, (PBL), service-learning (SL), and simulations all teach students how to apply course material.” Visual:

35. Case Method Teach Application PBL SL Simulations Verbal & Visual Variations Verbal: “When properly implemented, the case method, problem-based learning, (PBL), service-learning (SL), and simulations all teach students how to apply course material.” Visual:

36. Activity:Exercise in Thinking Graphically Use Worksheet 3

37. Activity:Designing A Graphic Syllabus for your Course