For many instructors, putting together a syllabus is the first (and often daunting) step toward a new teaching experience. A few years ago, at the American Sociological Association’s annual meetings, a panel on ‘Teaching Sociology for Beginners’ dealt with syllabus construction, among a number of other topics aimed to provide more resources for first-time instructors of introductory-level courses. The sociology department at the University of Buffalo has made some of these materials available electronically. 

Check out the links below.

• Essential Elements of a Syllabus: University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill Office of Educational Development
• Online Syllabus Workshop: Brown University
• Learning-Centered Syllabi Workshop: Lee Haugen, Iowa State University Center for Teaching Excellence
• Preparing a Syllabus: from The Penn State Teacher II: Learning to Teach; Teaching to Learn