Teacher instructions: Copy and paste these instructions into your own course to use with your students. Be sure to review the instructions before posting in your courses. You may want to make adjustments depending on how you plan to assess annotations or due to your specific discipline and/or syllabus. You may also have your students complete this assignment for a purpose other than the one described below — and should revise it to reflect your own purpose.

Instructions for students

Purpose: Now that we’ve completed much of the semester and are preparing for the upcoming exam, let’s review the syllabus. You’ll be adding annotations to the course objectives and topics listed in the syllabus to demonstrate what you’ve learned. You can review a quick-start guide for how to add annotations.

Instructions: As you return to the syllabus, add at least 2-3 annotations to the course objectives and/or topics listed there.

• Summarize the key ideas/concepts associated with a course objective or topic
• Make clear connections between topics in the course, and explain how they are related
• Ask a question about a topic or objective that you think you might see on an exam
• Add a link, image or video to your annotation that you think effectively demonstrates the key ideas of a course objective or topic (review instructions on how to add images, links or videos to annotations)
• Reply to a classmate with an additive annotation (add to the conversation by answering their question or extending their response). Here are some ideas on how to start an additive response to a classmate:
  • What did you mean by …
  • Did you consider …/ You might consider …
  • I think you should …
  • It made me think …

Important notes about annotating: 

• Make sure you hit “post” after you complete your annotation, or else your annotation will not be saved.
• Make sure it says “post to [this class]” and not “post to only me,” or else I won’t be able to review your annotations.
• If someone replies to your annotation, you will not receive a notification. Check back periodically to continue the conversation!