SYLLABUS/TEACHING PLAN PROJECT
If you choose to do a syllabus revision, please hand in:
1. Two versions of a syllabus for a course you teach or plan to teach, one from the past, and a revision based
on something you have learned as part of the NFTEP. The syllabus should contain information such as the course
description, assignments and grading, policies on make-up exams, etc., text, topics and order of coverage, and
anything else it is important for your students to know about you or the course.
2. A 1 to 2 page paper which explains and justifies decisions you have made about how to design your course, and
how you have (or plan to) communicated it to students. Please specifically discuss ways that you have revised the
course and why, and how these changes relate to your involvement with the NFTEP.
INSTEAD OF A SYLLABUS, YOU MAY CHOOSE SOME OTHER ASPECT OF YOUR TEACHING AND CARRY OUT A SIMILAR REVISION AND REFLECTION
PROJECT--examples below
You should plan on spending about 6-10 hours on the project. The following examples are provided just to get
you started thinking:
" a statement of teaching philosophy and outline of teaching portfolio. Part of becoming a reflective faculty
member is being able to explain your rationale for your teaching to colleagues. Portfolios are often used in hiring
as well as promotion and tenure decisions.
" summaries of several videos which might be useful for your course, with handouts to guide students' viewing
" a website you constructed for your class
" read and summarize books on college teaching (see instructor for suggestions)
" develop a set of case materials or sample data for use in student projects
" develop one or more computer simulations to serve as course demonstrations
" implement and evaluate some instructional innovation, such as having students give feedback to each other
on rough drafts of projects
" design a teaching/workshop for the general public (e.g., PTA) on your area of expertise (e.g., communicating
with your teenager, eating disorders)
" attend a regional conference on teaching in your discipline
Instructions for Program Reflections Notebook
As part of NFTEP, you will participate in a variety of activities. One of those activities is to keep a notebook
of your involvement with the program and your reflections on the meaning of those activities for you. This is for
two reasons.
First, when you put together your promotion and tenure dossier, you will want to be able to talk about your involvement
with the program, and what you learned in the program. If you keep notes of your activities and what you think
about them as you go along, you will be in a much better position to summarize this experience.
Second, the university would like to have evaluative material about the program, to help us learn what works and
what doesn't, and which may be used for publicity about the program.
What is a Program Reflections Notebook? You could think of it as a journal of your involvement with the NFTEP community.
Each time you participate in an event for the program. Write a page about what the activity was and what you learned
from it or thought about it. At the end of the term, please also write a brief abstract (about 150 words) of this
summary to be used in publicity for the program.