We’re headed into the fall semester, and I thought it might be helpful to round up some resources—some by me, some not—that provide things to think about as we craft our syllabi and plan our first days.

Syllabus resources

Here’s an older piece I wrote that gives students some advice about how to interact with their instructors: [How to Build Relationships with Your Teachers: Advice from College Professors]

Thinking about the language we use in our syllabi is really crucial in terms of establishing welcome and belonging: [What do our syllabi really say?]

There are dozens of ways to react to the existence of generative AI. Here is the way that I chose to approach it: [Thinking about ChatGPT], with a follow-up a semester later with some tweaks: [Following up a semester later].

Leon Furze has some wonderful guidance on GenAI in [Choosing your GenAI policy]

Dr. Nicole Bedera offers a vital introduction to the new Title IX rules, the problems with them, and ways to establish a Title IX policy that’s trauma-informed:  [Twitter Guide to a Trauma-Informed Title IX syllabus policy]. If you’re nt on twitter, here’s a link to many of the same points in [article form].

I’m a huge fan of having students annotate the syllabus instead of us reading it aloud on the first day. Here’s Dr. Remi Kailr’s [Guide to Annotating the Syllabus].

First day / first week activities

One of the things I recommend we do for ourselves before we begin to teach, but also encourage our students to do (in ways that protect their privacy) is to have them engage with [The Social Identity List].

Setting community guidelines for conversation can be such a help when difficult topics come up. These are the ground rules I use as a starting point with my classes, but we collectively edit them to reflect the perspective of each group of students.[Ground Rules].

Students often feel they don’t have the skills needed to tackle the problems they see around them. Having them fill out [Human Asset Maps] can help!  (I would change the illustration now so as not to imply a human who can stand easily. A seated figure would work just as well.]

This past year I worked with students on thinking about how to maximize their skills when it came to attention, and to suggest hacks for students who find it really challenging: [Attentiveness and its Lack].

And finally, for historians, a first-day activity that helps make clear exactly what is it that we do for a living: [What do Historians do?].

Enjoy!