Getting Started

The syllabus is one of the first impressions that students receive of your course and teaching style. Using a “positive, respectful, and inviting” tone off the bat can begin to establish a sense of trust with students. The CCTL Syllabus Guide identifies several considerations, including: 

• Using first- and second-person pronouns (we, you, I) to demonstrate your commitment to creating a collaborative learning environment where student contributions are valued. 
• Conveying your enthusiasm about the material and students’ engagement with it. 

For more discussion on syllabus tone, consider exploring Russell Johnson’s Teaching Spotlight, “Expectations and Tone in Syllabus Construction”. 

Diversity statements show how you value and respect diversity and emphasize an understanding that individual difference is a necessary and valuable precursor to cultivating an atmosphere of open intellectual exchange. A sample diversity statement can be found in both the CCTL Syllabus Guide and Faculty Teaching Handbook. 

Student learning does not occur in a vacuum. Without access to resources to address students’ physical, social, and emotional needs, it can be extremely difficult for them to learn to their fullest potential. The University of Chicago offers a variety of student support resources, ranging from student counseling, to emergency financial assistance, to support for disability support, and more. For a list of UChicago resources for student support, please explore the Faculty Teaching Handbook. 

As students adjust to the university and the standards of scholarship associated each of their courses, it is important to “set clear policies at the beginning of class, discuss these policies, and review them” throughout the academic year. The “Expectations, Course Flexibility, and Student Engagement” report from the CCTL Working Group offers guidance for articulating course policies related to attendance, late assignments, grades, and College policies. 

Expectations about class participation can highly vary across academic disciplines, course types, and instructors. Provide students with examples of rich and meaningful engagement in your course, which can help clarify your own expectations while lowering student anxiety about participating. Examples include:  

• Asking students to arrive to class with a selected quotation or passage to discuss. 
• Asking students to prepare 2-3 questions about a particular topic or assignment. 
• Asking students to identify a practice problem that they struggled with. 

As the CCTL Syllabus Guide identifies, instructors can also consider "building in opportunities for participation that may take place outside the classroom, such as office hours, discussion posts on Canvas, and the like.”

ISBN numbers and library links allow low-income students and/or students with disabilities to find versions of required texts that are adaptable to their specific needs (e.g., adaptable for screen readers or that have audio versions available). This addition can also assist students in locating lower-cost or free versions of course texts. 

Consider including a disability statement in your syllabus or reviewing the accommodation process on the first day of class. Sample statements can be located in the Faculty Teaching Handbook. 

The Center for Digital Accessibility (CDA) at UChicago offers monthly trainings on different topics related to digital accessibility. Consider registering for a live virtual training or exploring the CDA’s asynchronous trainings and resources.

Students may experience office hours for the first time at the University of Chicago. In addition, different instructors may have different expectations about how office hours should be utilized, how often students should attend, and so on. Be explicit and offer examples of the uses of office hours, such as: 

• Building professional relationships with your professors 
• Discussing questions or concerns they have in your course 
• Chatting about course materials

When possible, be available near your classroom before or after class for informal conversation and/or course help for students. Not only can this serve as an opportunity for relationship building for students, but it also provides additional opportunities for students to receive course support.

To help you learn your students’ names and pronouns, consider: 

• Printing out a photo roster (available through FacultyAccess) to help associate preferred names and pronouns with faces.  
• Asking students to say their names before they ask a question or share a thought.  
• Exploring NameCoach, available through Canvas, which allows students and instructors to record how they would like their names to be pronounced. 

Encourage students to get to know their classmates’ names and pronouns when sharing ideas to establish a friendlier and more collegial classroom environment throughout the quarter. 

Our cultural backgrounds influence what it means to be respectful in interactions, and faculty and instructors choose to be addressed in a variety of ways (e.g., Dr., Professor) that may not be obvious to students. Direct communication about how you would like to addressed can help limit student confusion or anxiety when they interact with you.

This practice models life-long learning, encourages development of students’ passion, and helps them see potential paths into your discipline.

Explicitly establishing classrooms norms helps to maintain an inclusive environment and signals to students the type of contributions that are important for learning. Topics to discuss include:  

• How students should engage during discussion or lecture (e.g., raise their hands, speak freely, refer to each other by name, introduce themselves before making a comment, etc.). 
• Modeling how disagreements are respectfully handled. 

For more information on establishing a strong class climate, please view the Inclusive Discussions webpage.

Use terms for groups of people that are respectful in current times.  

• Prioritize non-gendered terms (e.g., “folks” or “people” rather than “men” or “women”; “first-year students” rather than “freshmen”). 
• Prioritize contemporary language to refer a racial or ethnic group (e.g., “Black” or “African-American”) even if texts use terms that were considered appropriate for the historical era in which they were written. Note that some terms are contested because some argue that environments, not people, create stigma (e.g., person-first or identity-first language). 
• We invite you to explore Disability Inclusive Language Guidelines or Inclusive Language: Race & Ethnicity for more guidance. 

Consider requesting a CCTL Midcourse Review (MCR) to collect information from your students about how they are experiencing the course. In an MCR, a member of the CCTL staff conducts a 20-minute focus group with your students about halfway through the quarter and will meet with you to discuss the results. This service is confidential and is meant to provide constructive, in-depth feedback on your teaching from the perspective of your students.

Connecting students’ existing knowledge to the new concepts in your course helps students see their intellectual growth and aids in information recall. 

In addition to explaining your own academic journey and what brought you to your field, let students see how and what you’ve learned from your failures. This helps to normalize failure as an integral part of the learning process. Melanie Stefan presents this idea in her article “A CV of failures,” and Johannes Haushofer offers an example.