Start with your syllabus schedule. Rest assured this can stay the same whatever format you are teaching in. Use your syllabus schedule to rough in the contours of your online course shell in Canvas.

Use the modules link to organize your course into modules. Modules gather pages related to each other by subject and content. Think of it as creating an interactive syllabus schedule that then links to all the learning content you will present during the semester. This allows students to access everything from a single page and to see the content in context for the full course in sequence as they scroll down the module page.

I organize my modules by major course themes with one theme per module and a few online orientation and housekeeping modules up top. Examples of the latter include tips for using Canvas as I have it set up, the importance of mutual respect in online interactions, forums for introductions, and a space for students to share resources and link to articles related to course content and ask questions of general interest.

The course content modules for my Introduction to Political Science course are sequenced as follows:

Module 1: All semester assignments

Module 2: Basic course concepts

Module 3: From Power to Empowerment and Justice

Module 4: Human Rights, Justice and Power

Module 5:  The Search for Freedom and Justice (i.e. introducing major ideologies)

Module 6: Different kinds of Liberals and Conservatives

Module 7: Political Socialization

Module 8: Socialization and the Media

Module 9: Final Presentation prompt

My preference is to subdivide within the modules by week using the text header. Some content or sub-themes within a module may take a week, another sub-theme two or three weeks, so it is flexible. You will know what makes sense for your course. For instance, I present theories of justice over two weeks and basic course concepts for one week. I subdivide modules by week throughout the semester to provide orientation and a guide for students, especially in introductory courses. This still allows the course themes, and how they build on each other, to be the primary way the course is organized. This design makes these themes very clear to students.

My colleagues use both similar and different approaches. Prof. Thorsten Spehn’s design is similar. Prof. Betcy Jose uses week as the primary organizer and themes within weeks. Prof. Christoph Stephes, also a veteran online instructor, focuses on organizing thematic modules in his upper division courses with readings, other learning content, and assignments. Assignment due dates provide the temporal cues to students to pace themselves. He also has an interesting approach with leading the module with the assignment and grouping the relevant content pages below.

These different examples show there are a variety of ways to organize your course content in ways meaningful to students. Think about what best suits your material and teaching style. Depending on the class I may use all these methods, a combination, or one organizing approach primarily. No matter how you ultimately organize your course you will build out the course in the modules which will then contain links to learning content pages.

The next post in this series will look at the kinds of learning content to populate your modules.