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Sandy

Excerpt from Book II

The Syllabus Receipt

When we share our syllabus with students, it is a good idea to have them create a “Syllabus Receipt.” It increases the ownership of the receipt if the students write the receipt themselves. The receipt can be as simple as the teacher writing on the overhead “(Teacher name) has explained the syllabus and I have received a copy.” Notice I do not ask them to agree with everything in the syllabus, but just to acknowledge that I have explained it to them. (I do not go over the syllabus until after we have created the Behavior Contract. The “agree” part of the syllabus happens with the Behavior Contract - explained in Book One and repeated in Appendix C). Students copy the receipt content from the overhead, followed by their printed name and date. Then they sign the paper. (I know we could copy the statement on Xerox for them, but there is more buy-in if they write the whole receipt themselves.) I then collect the syllabus receipt papers and simply put a check in the grade book. Of course, there will be some absent people and some late arrivers to join the class, but now I have a record of who has received the syllabus. It is also a way to remind me who still needs a syllabus. (This is an example of “WIIFM in Stereo.” The students receive the syllabus, and I receive an indicator for which students have heard the content of the syllabus. (In Book One I introduced the radio station that everyone likes to listen to – no matter what his or her age, skin color or religion. It is called WIIFM and it stands for What’s In It For Me? It is best if we can play WIIFM in stereo whenever possible. That is, “What’s in it for students AND what’s in it for teachers?" In this way we have a win-win situation. Students benefit and teachers benefit.)

If a student ever challenges the classroom expectations, it is REALLY handy to have the “Syllabus Receipt” and a copy of the syllabus and Behavior Contract at the conference with parents. Now we have irrefutable proof that the student was made aware of the class expectations “early in the game.” I have included a sample of my syllabus and “Syllabus Receipt” at the end of this chapter.