A few last suggestions about your syllabus project

I'm signing off of e-mail and blogging for the evening, as I have to finish getting ready for my conference trip -- the Journalism Education Association/National Scholastic Press Association convention in St. Louis. 

As we've talked about in class, university faculty jobs have three components -- teaching, research and service. The amount of time allocated to each depends on your university and your specific job. At UF, those with the greatest service components typically are in outreach programs, like extension work. One part of my service work is with scholastic journalism -- high school and middle school journalism students and teachers. 

I haven't received any e-mails or seen any postings on our blog in terms of questions about the syllabus project. As I won't have Internet access for the rest of the week, I'd suggest that you talk with classmates if you do have questions.

A few last thoughts:

• Big picture - Be sure you think about Bloom's Taxonomy as you develop your class assignments, tests and activities. We want students to be performing up the scale, not just at the knowledge level.
  
• Extra credit - Kara made several good points about extra credit, including not letting extra credit make a significant change in a student's grade or be on work not directly related to course goals.
  
• Grading for class participation - Jen provided a rubric for evaluating discussion participation. That may be more detailed than what you would provide students. Keep in mind that a class participation grade is more appropriate for a smaller class than a large class -- unless you are giving attendance-related quizzes.
  
• Your bio - I haven't included bio in my own syllabi but will starting next semester. I like that suggestion. A short bio helps establish your background. You could start with the 100-word bio you wrote for our class and revise as appropriate.
• Lesson plans - As I noted on the handout, you don't want to write a script but do need to provide more than a list of topics you would cover. If you plan a PowerPoint presentation, please include a handout or the slides. You do not need to identify and embed links to specific examples, such as a news clip. You can note the kind of story you would want to show.