Course Design Worksheet

This five-step worksheet is designed to structure the pre-planning processes for developing an online course for The Saylor Foundation. An overview of this five-step process is outlined below:

Step 1: Brainstorming about Course Expectations and Goals

Step 2: Researching Course Design

Step 3: Conduct a Cursory Search for Content

Step 4: Designing Learning Outcomes

Step 5: Begin to Select Outcome-Aligned Content

Course Title:

Initial Thoughts/Ideas/Notes:

Step 1: Brainstorming about Course Expectations and Goals

Please jot down any initial thoughts, questions, goals, and/or concerns you have in the design of this course.

  1. What do you want students to know and be able to do at the end of this course?
  1. What materials/activities do you want to include in your course to ensure that students meet those goals?
  1. Given that this course will be posted online for students to progress through at their own pace, what special considerations need to be made?

Step 2: Researching Course Design

Reflect on your own experience teaching this course and compare that approach to syllabi that other educators have made available online. Pull from a variety of institutions—from public to private to non-traditional schools. The goal here is to inform yourself on how others have approached the challenge of course design for your chosen course. List the syllabi you consulted below, and feel free to add any notes that you might have. An example is provide in the first slot:

Syllabus 1: Yale University: Professor Jen Shoop’s “The Modernist Poem” course

Link:

Notes: Pitched towards an advanced, senior-level audience; discussion-based. Would need to figure out how to gear this course towards an independent learner. The general historical approach is sound.

Syllabus 2:

Link:

Notes:

Syllabus 3:

Link:

Notes:

Syllabus 4:

Link:

Notes:

Syllabus 5:

Link:

Notes:

Now, begin to identify and itemize major concepts, subjects, and approaches you would like to incorporate and/or progressions you have in mind for the course. Use the space below to capture your current thoughts.

Step 3: Conduct a Cursory Search for Content

As described in subunit 2.2.3 of SAYLOR101, you will now conduct a search for big pieces of content that may be of use in your course. Feel free to touch base with our archivist, use the tools outlined in SAYLOR101, and dig around on your own. Keep a note of any and all of these tools in the space provided below.

Step 4: Designing Learning Outcomes

4a. Subunit 2.3 of SAYLOR101 contains explicit instructions on how to design well-articulated, measurable learning outcomes. Please revisit these guidelines and then begin to jot down your initial ideas for these outcomes here.

Make sure that your learning outcomes are aligned with the standards used for this course, such as the Common Core State Standards.

As a first step in this process, you may want to think about the different categories of goals you might have for students and to jot some of these down. Note that the third category—a bit more qualitative—was not presented in SAYLOR101, but you may wish to consider it as you approach this course’s design:

__ Key content (What should students know? What are the key facts, applications, theories, terms, etc. that students should master and apply?)

__ Key skills (What should students be able to do? Consider writing skills, research skills, critical thinking skills, computer skills, technical skills, etc.)

__ Attitudes (How do you want students to approach a given topic? For example, consider appreciation for a given field/subject, global perspective on a given topic, etc.)

4b. Now consider the different levels at which students can perform, and think through some of the goals you’ve listed above. Which levels do you envision your students achieving for the different goals listed above?

__Knowledge (the student can recall a fact)

__ Comprehension (the student can understand an idea)

__ Application (the student can apply an idea)

__ Analysis (the student can break an idea or concept down to make its organization logical to him or herself)

__ Synthesis (the student can integrate different parts or ideas into a unified whole)

__ Evaluation (the student can judge the worth of an idea, concept, procedure, etc., using specific criteria)

4c. Now, draft a seriesof course-wide objectives you have in mind for the course:

Step 5: Begin to Select Outcome-Aligned Content

Now that you have your outcomes fairly well-defined, think through the different types of assignment and activities you would like to include in your course. It may well be that these do not currently exist on the web, and we may need to build them out ourselves. Consider which you would ideally like to feature in your course and we will work to make those objectives a reality.

__ Lecture series

__ Independent reading

__ Journaling

__ Animations/demos

__ Web media clips

__ e-Gallery visit (e.g., GoogleArt)

__ Presentation handouts

__ Illustrations and graphs

__ Demonstrations

__ Debates

__ Problem sets

__ Lab exercises/experiments

__ Case methods

__ Role play

__ Essay prompts

__ Small group sessions

__ Library/internet research

__ Games/simulations

__ Field research

__ Independent study

__ Metacognitive reflection/journaling

__ Exhibitions/capstone projects

__ Work experience/teaching others

__ Group projects/discussions

__ Discussion boards

__ Wikispace development/participation

__ Weekly quizzes

__ Reading questions with self-assessment rubrics

Keep in mind, as you begin to pair your course with materials that students will be working in an unproctored, online environment. They need explicit instructions to guide the studying and learning process, and these guidelines can take any number of forms:

  • The framing notes in your resource boxes
  • The course and unit introduction sections
  • Checklists
  • Rubrics to guide instruction, learning, and assessment
  • Practice tests
  • Modeling/simulation of problem-solving and question-answering (e.g. guides to responding, step-by-step solutions, etc.)

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