FSU Math Course Syllabus Guidance

Syllabus Requirements

Strong Recommendations

I recommend you do not simply post a link to a PDF, but create your syllabus in Canvas using the built-in "Design Tools". Go to your syllabus tab, click Edit to edit the page, then go up to the upper right hand corner and hover over the litte rocket ship to open the "Design Tools" button. Then click on "Add Content Blocks".

All of the various required paragraphs are listed there as content blocks that you can import with a single click. The great advantage of this is that the wording of these blocks is controlled centrally, and updated automatically whenever the required language is revised, so you are always up to date with no effort!

Design Tools also allow you to easily import content blocks for all the other elements of your syllabus in an easy-to-read format. If you haven't used Design Tools before, it can be used in constructing all other pages in your Canvas site as well.

A lot of extra help in designing useful and effective Canvas course sites, including Design Tools, can be found here: https://odl.fsu.edu/training-workshops

Syllabus Best Practices

A good syllabus is a fairly new concept for many mathematicians. For years my syllabi described what *I*, the instructor, intended to do (e.g. cover a list of topics), not what *my students* were going to do.

Here is a helpful email from FSU's CAT on making a good syllabus: CAT Email of Aug 16, 2021.

Part of the idea is to identify active and specific student goals. As an example of this kind of thing, take a look at UC Berkeley's Learning Goals for Math Majors:

The math community has progressed a lot lately. For more discussion of these and related topics, I recommend the MAA's Instructional Practices Guide: Most related to the Syllabus is the Design Practices section, beginning on page 89.