Syllabus

<p><b>How redesigning your syllabus can transform your teaching your classroom and the way your students learn</b> <p/>Generations of teachers have built their classes around the course syllabus a semester-long contract that spells out what each class meeting will focus on (readings problem sets case studies experiments) and what the student has to turn in by a given date. But what does that way of thinking about the syllabus leave out--about our teaching and more importantly about our students' learning? <p/>In <i>Syllabus </i>William Germano and Kit Nicholls take a fresh look at this essential but almost invisible bureaucratic document and use it as a starting point for rethinking what students--and teachers--do. What if a teacher built a semester's worth of teaching and learning backward--starting from what students need to learn <i>to do </i>by the end of the term and only then selecting and arranging the material students need to study? <p/>Thinking through the lived moments of classroom engagement--what the authors call coursetime--becomes a way of striking a balance between improv and order. With fresh insights and concrete suggestions <i>Syllabus</i> shifts the focus away from the teacher to the work and growth of students moving the classroom closer to the genuinely collaborative learning community we all want to create.</p>