Syllabus Resources for A&P

Fall is the traditional start of the academic year, so as we approach that mark it may be a good time to think about ways to tweak our course syllabus in ways that may promote student success.  There are some "teaching moments" in a syllabus that we don't want to miss!I have few suggestions for you to consider.ChunkingExperts call it excessive cognitive load and I say it's just plain rude to put all your policies, procedures, advice, and explanations in one or two big lumps, then expect students to actually read it and be familiar with the contents. Go ahead and get it all down there--then chunk it by dividing it up into short sections, each with a short, descriptive heading.  Next, rearrange all your newly chunked sections into logical groupings with a short descriptive heading.  Now students will more likely read through it all, comprehend it better, and be more likely to refer to the syllabus before emailing you with their questions that can easily be answered by the syllabus.DeadlinesWe often blame it on which generation's pesonality they are ruled by—X, Y, millenial, baby-boomer—but I think it's just human nature to miss deadlines when you are unaware of the effects of doing that.A syllabus is a good place to establish deadlines in a course, of course, but it's also a great place to briefly explain why deadlines are important.  You may want to get some ideas from this brief article—or simply link to the article from your syllabus:my-ap.us/WIhjZz...
Source: The A and P Professor - Category: Physiology Authors: Source Type: blogs