A Teaching Timeline: From Pre-Term Planning to the Final Exam

As an instructor or Teaching Fellow (TF), you have many responsibilities—to your students, most obviously; but also to the other members of your teaching team, the department or program in which you are teaching, and even to administrative units like the Registrar. Your work may include everything from setting goals and planning the arc of the term, planning and teaching each week, giving and receiving feedback, grading the final projects or exams, and debriefing at the end of term with the teaching team. Use this step-by-step guide with supplemental resources to help you navigate all of the stages of teaching, from pre-term to after the course ends.

> Make your own copy of this timeline

Before Student Registration Opens

• Reflect on what motivates and energizes you about teaching. Review and clarify your goals for the course and your students, as well as your own goals for your teaching and learning this term.
• Schedule a consultation with the Bok Center to review any questions or ideas you have about the design of your syllabus or assignments, or to request support for a specific area of TF training. Check out the Bok Center’s programming for PhD students, especially their pre-semester Fall Teaching Conference and Winter Teaching Week for TFs and TAs.
• Talk with your Department Administrator about departmental procedures for things like printing/scanning/copying, reserving classrooms or office space controlled by the department, and ordering desk copies of textbooks.
• Determine your—and your students'—technology needs. If students will need specialized software packages (and/or access to high-performance hardware capable of running specialized software), contact Academic Technology for the FAS to discuss the available options.
• Make plans for managing the course Canvas site. You may request help from Academic Technology for the FAS.
• Request course-related library resources through Course Reserves, and reach out to a course librarian to support your students’ research experiences.
• Complete and publish your syllabus on your Canvas site. Make sure that, in addition to information about assignments and the course’s assessment scheme, your syllabus includes information about:
  • The Honor Code and your expectations for students with regard to collaboration, proper citation, submission of individual work, etc.
  • How you will communicate with students about letters from the Disability Access Office. The DAO provides the following accessibility statement that you should include on the syllabus: "Harvard University values inclusive excellence and providing equal educational opportunities for all students. Our goal is to remove barriers for disabled students related to inaccessible elements of instruction or design in this course. If reasonable accommodations are necessary to provide access, please contact the Disability Access Office (DAO). Accommodations do not alter fundamental requirements of the course and are not retroactive. Students should request accommodations as early as possible, since they may take time to implement. Students should notify DAO at any time during the semester if adjustments to their communicated accommodation plan are needed."
  • The kind of environment that you wish to co-create with students for the benefit of their learning.

Before the First Day of Class

• Meet with your teaching team to discuss roles and responsibilities. Use a pre-term planner or something similar to make sure everyone understands the goals of the course as well as their specific roles and responsibilities.
• Review relevant policies with your teaching team, including:
  • FERPA regulations governing the privacy of student work.
  • The Honor Code and your collaboration policies.
  • Title IX and sexual and/or gender-based harassment resources.
  • The resources available through the Disability Access Office.
  • Policies from the FAS and the Office of Undergraduate Education.
• Familiarize yourself with the Registrar’s sectioning tool, and Roombook, if applicable.
• Visit your classroom(s) to familiarize yourself with the layout and technology. If you have specific audio-visual needs or questions, contact Education Support Services.
• Plan for the first day of class, and how you will create a welcoming and inclusive environment for student learning.

During the Term

• Make arrangements for appropriate accommodations for students who request them; you may wish to reach out to the Disability Access Office for guidance.
• Meet regularly with your teaching team to discuss issues that come up in class and plan future classes and sections.
• Make sure you have clear guidelines and expectations (for both teaching staff and students) for managing grading and feedback.
• If you have one or more midterm exams:
  • Organize and stress-test the logistics. (E.g. If students are downloading a time-delimited take-home, make sure it’s uploaded to Canvas, that the download permissions are set properly, and that students know how to access and submit the exam.)
  • Obtain blue books for seated exams by emailing exams@fas.harvard.edu seven days before the exam.
  • If there are students with accommodations, you may need to book additional rooms for them to take a seated exam.
• Get feedback from your students regularly and at midterm. Make a plan to review the midterm feedback with the teaching team and address it with students, and make any mid-term course adjustments.
• Consider scheduling a midterm feedback consultation with the Bok Center and/or requesting to have your class observed or videotaped to learn more about how your course is going.

End of Term

• If you have a final project and/or take-home exam:
  • Review the deadlines by which students must submit their work and by which your course must submit grades to the Registrar.
  • Review the procedures for administering/proctoring the final exam as applicable.
  • Plan how students’ final exams/projects will be graded.
• Plan for a final teaching staff meeting where you will sign off on any unfinished business of the course, determine students’ final grades, and discuss how the course went, as well as any feedback from the teaching team for the next time it’s offered.