Designing Our Courses

How do you put together a course in a virtual or "blended" setting-where some students might be in class and others might be online? Below are links to several resources-including videos of two fairly comprehensive W&L workshops. In the end, there are plenty of options. The key is to choose models that feel right for your courses, your students, and your style of teaching. Then stick with them.

• Designing for Agility, Part 1 and Part 2
  This two-day W&L workshop - Part 1 and Part 2 - provides a top-to-bottom approach for how to design your courses at a time when none of us really know what the future will bring. Co-led with Dr. Jeanine Stewart, former dean of W&L. 
  
• Four Models for HiFlex Course Design
  From the Open CoLab at Plymouth State University. 
  
• Seven Models for Fall Instruction
  These models come from Clemson University. Only explore if you're comfortable having your head explode. 
  
• Spring Term Course Design Workshops at W&L
  Four videos and related powerpoint from our pre-Spring Term workshop on how to put together an experiential course. Particular topics include: creating effective course goals, structuring our courses, building community, and managing the course to maintain our sanity.
• Three Models for Blended Instruction
  Check out these different models outlined by Gary Hawkins of Warren Wilson College. He also includes a weekly sketch of what each model would look like in practice.
• The Tutorial Approach
  A brief essay by a neuroscientist on one simple but productive way to approach virtual instruction.
• The Zoomflex Model
  A brief and effective video describing one very reasonable model for structuring our courses on a daily basis to accommodate face-to-face, virtual, and asynchronous students.