Course and Curricular Design Resources

 

Working on your syllabus? Try these guides:

Wondering how much AI to integrate into your course?

  • Consult our guide on how to write an AI statement, with three sample statements to model from. Reviewed with the Division of Undergraduate Learning as compatible with the university's policies on academic integrity.


Planning out units in your course?  Use some of these resources:

  • 7 E's Template An Instructional Model Template (7 E’s) for unit or lesson planning.
  • The One Sentence Lesson Plan (Video based on OTEI workshop - 12:52) Learn how to focus your lessons with a one-sentence lesson plan. As faculty, we tend to focus too much on teaching and pack in too much content. The one-sentence lesson plan helps you focus on student learning by addressing three simple elements: the what, the how, and the why of your lesson.

Working on a departmental curriculum?

External Resources:

A Quick Guide to the "Understanding by Design" Process. A primer on the backward design approach to course design. (Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching)

A Valid and Reliable Syllabus Rubric: Palmer, M. S., Bach, D. J., & Streifer, A. C. (2014). Measuring the promise: A learning‐focused syllabus rubric. To improve the academy: A journal of educational development, 33 (1), 14-36.

Clemson Library: 

Creating Significant Learning Experiences: An Integrated Approach to Designing College Courses  [ebook] – by L. Dee Fink

Fink addresses research on how people learn; active learning; and how student engagement relates to student learning. This book provides conceptual and procedural tools for designing a course using a taxonomy of significant learning (based on Bloom’s Taxonomy) and research-based best practices for learning-centered teaching. 

The Understanding by Design Guide to Advanced Concepts in Creating and Reviewing Units  [ebook] – by Grant P. Wiggins and Jay McTighe (2012)

This book addresses course design using a backwards design approach that is most effective for student learning.

How People Learn II: Learners, Contexts, and Cultures  [ebook] – by Committee on How People Learn II (2018)

This updated version of the 2000 report includes more recent research on how people learn throughout the lifespan and is a great resource for educators of both students and adults.