Constructing a Course Outline or Syllabus

A course outline is a document that benefits students and instructors. It is an essential

piece when designing any course. The course outline has a few purposes.

A syllabus is a planning tool. Writing it guides the instructor’s development of the

course. Through the development of a syllabus, instructors can set course goals,
develop student learning objectives, create and align assessment plans, as well as
establish a schedule for the course.

A course outline or syllabus also works as a guide for students. By setting course
goals and student learning outcomes, you are informing students about the materials
they will engage. The schedule also tells students what expectations are had of them
and provides a timeline of these expectations.

Finally, a course outline also works as a reference for colleagues, administrators, and
accreditation agencies. It allows others to see what you are doing in your course, and
what is expected of your students. In some cases, others may refer to your course
outline to determine what skills students should have after completing your course.
Related courses that utilize your course as a prerequisite or co-requisite will likely build
on the outcomes mapped out in your current course outline.

When creating your course outline there are some essential pieces that you need to
include:

Course Description from the Academic Calendar

The University Calendar has a description of your course that gets published every
year. It is a good idea to take a look at this description because this may be the
description your students are using to determine if they wish to take your course or
not.

Course Goals
What are the big ideas that you are going to cover in your course? What are the
essential understandings that students will take away with them after the course has
finished? It is important to define these course goals, as they will help you determine
what you expect from your students, and what your students can expect from the
course.

Student Learning Objectives/Outcomes

Designing outcomes is essential to designing your course and is a valuable element to
have in your syllabus. The outcomes are usually statements that are verb oriented and
directed at the students. For example: “Students will be able to identify key
geomorphological formations on a Southern Alberta map.” This example uses the verb
identify, which is a lower level thinking skill. A higher order thinking skill is incorporated
in the next example: “Students will be able to read and analyze population maps
interpreting any trends the data may show.”
Assessment Overview
The assessment overview is a grading guide that allows students to see what
weightings can apply to the different assessment elements of a course. An example of
an assessment overview is below.
Quizzes: 50%
Participation: 5%
Journal Assignments: 20%
Team Assignment: 10%
Final Exam: 15%
As well as including the overview of grading, a grading scale should be identified for
the students, so they understand at what level they are performing. Grade scales can
range between faculties and departments. It is best that you check with your
department and faculty and use the scale they wish you to use.

Assessment Plan
Assessment plans are built in line with student learning objectives. Student learning
objectives state what students will learn while your assessment plan states how you,
as an instructor, will gather evidence for achievement of the objectives. The
assessment plan will detail the type of assessments that will occur within the course
structure, how they will be marked, and how they provide evidence of student learning.
Your assessment plan will more than likely consist of multiple assessments ranging
from online examinations to essays and group projects. Different assessments can
and should be used to find evidence for multiple outcomes.

Schedule of Activities
This portion of the outline should be built once the plan has been made. Once you
understand how you want to assess your students, you can create activities that help
facilitate the learning that needs to be done to help students achieve the objectives.
Course activities should work in parallel with the assessment plan. If students need to
provide evidence of learning by completing a multiple choice exam, then the activities
in the schedule should prepare them for this assessment. Lectures, readings, small
group and whole group discussions can all be activities that help the student meet
their learning objectives.

Plagiarism Announcement
Due to student privacy issues, if you wish to submit your student’s work through a
plagiarism detection service such as Tinnitus, you must inform your students that you
are going to do so. Furthermore, if students request an alternative method of
plagiarism detection because of privacy concerns, you must provide them with an
alternate option.

Reading List
It is a good idea to put the readings for the course within the syllabus. What you
include may simply be a reference to a textbook, or it may be many references to
online readings. Listed readings will allow students, administrators, and other
educators see what content will is to be covered within the course. Listed readings
also allow students to prepare for your course and acquire the texts needed. If the
location of your readings is within a Learning Management System such as Moodle, it
is still a good idea to list these readings within the syllabus.