Question: What should be included in the syllabus section in a Canvas course?
Question: What should be included in the syllabus section in a Canvas course?
My ‘Welcome Students...Start here’ is a quick link on the home page which points students to the Syllabus tab which includes the following...
•Syllabus (pdf)
•Required text with url link
•Recommended reading
•Course calendar
Hope this helps!
I suggest to faculty that they put any "boilerplate" information or links to policies that could change into the Syllabus tool. The less you have to update from powers outside your course, the easier it is on you for future iterations. My general suggestion is to think about what information students need access to from the syllabus, but not necessarily something they need on their printed version. Not only do you save trees, but it allows you to create a printable version that is more useful for students everyday in the class without wading through all the required statements.
As stated above, using the Rich Content Editor to add your syllabus is also great for universal design. You can add color charts for grades:
Or easy to identify icons:
I usually also suggest making the syllabus the Home Page for the first week of a course so you know students have see it in the beginning each time they open the course
Hi Clint Bruess
Welcome to the Canvas Community. There is really no right or wrong answer to this. To start with, allow me to point you to two online lessons from the instructor's guide:
You should also check with your own institution regarding any specific guidelines they have for syllabi in general, of course. Many faculty will just link to a Word or PDF version of their syllabus and leave it at that. For the purposes of universal design, that's not a great idea, so some will copy/paste from their Word version and embed it within the Syllabus page, which is great. (For details check How do I add and modify text in the Rich Content Editor as an instructor? )
One great feature is that the page will have a built-in course calendar, courtesy of the Course Summary that will automatically appear, and which is covered in more detail in that first link. As you publish your assignments that have due dates, these will automatically appear in that Course Summary area. This is a good reason to use your Student View early and often as you build your course site, since YOU (as the instructor) will see everything on that summary that is created, but your students will not; they will only see the assignments that you have published.
I hope this helps a bit, Clint!