You want your students to be engaged. Your students want you to be engaging.

This exercise will show you how to do both.

Best of all, it will create engagement from the first day of class until the last.

The Syllabus Post-It Cloud

In our last post we described the basics of getting your students bought-into your course using the Problem Post-Its Cloud.

Now we’re going to show you the advanced version, where you’ll use the final Problem Post-It cloud to modify your course syllabus in real-time.

Note: if you’ve already read the last post on Problem Post-It clouds, you can skip to Step 4.

Step 1:

Give each student a pack of post-it notes. Ask each student to write down their top 5 problems or fears in each category below – remind them to only write one problem/fear per post-it note.

• Entrepreneurship
• Business
• Career
• Relationships
• Money

Don’t give them too long for this step, you want instinctual thoughts here, 2-minutes per subject should be enough.

Step 2:

Ask your students to review their 25 post-it notes and pick out the 5 that are the scariest, most concerning, to them.

With their top 5 problems, ask them all to join you at a wall in your classroom. Tell your students that collectively you’re going to create problem clouds, so you can see the most common problems among your customers students.

When everyone is standing with you at the wall, ask for someone to volunteer one of their problems. They might say:

I don’t know how to build a network.

To which you can reply, “Okay, great, who else has a post-it that says something about building a network?”

Every student who has that problem will raise their hand. Collect all those notes and put them up on your wall together to make a cloud for the “Build a Network” problem.

Repeat Step 2 until you have everyone’s post-it notes on the wall, grouped into problem clouds.

Step 3: Connect the Dots

Look at the wall. You now know your students’ most common problems and fears. Most importantly, you know them in their own words.

Now is your chance to connect the dots for your students between their problems and fears and the skills you’re going to teach them.

If you can paint this picture, your students will engage!

Your opportunity here is to reflect your students’ problems and say, “During this class, we’re going to solve these problems” using your students’ actual words and problems.

You can tell them, “If you’re unsure how to find and talk to people to build a network, you can use the same techniques I’m going to teach you in this class to identify the people you want in your network!”

Encourage them further by saying, “The same techniques you’re going to use to interview customers, you can use to interview potential mentors and bosses – increasing the size and quality of your network. You can build your dream network using the skills you’ll learn in this course!”

Step 4: Beginning a New Syllabus

Now you can take your students’ engagement to a whole new level!

You can begin to update your syllabus on the fly in front of them to match the goals of the class with their problems and fears.

1. Pull up your syllabus on the screen and scroll to the place where you list your schedule of topics and deliverables by date or class session.
2. Add a column where you can add their problem / fear that corresponds with the topic.
3. Pick the two problem clouds with the most post-it notes. Type in those two problems in the new column corresponding to the appropriate course topic.
   
   For instance, next to the Customer Interviewing topic, in the new column, type “Build a Network.” Reiterate to your students that the techniques they will learn to interview customers will help them build a strong network.
   Or if they’re low on cash, you can describe how the techniques you’ll show them when they generate pre-sales for their product can help them discover a profitable business during this semester.
   If they’re having relationship challenges, you can describe how empathetic interviewing techniques can help them connect with family, friends and significant others.

That’s the great thing about teaching entrepreneurial skills…

[bctt tweet=”Entrepreneurial skills = life skills.” via=”no”]

Virtually any challenge your students face can be aided in some way via the lessons you teach in your experiential entrepreneurship class.

Step 5: Delivering a New Syllabus

Overnight, finish adding the problems and fears from the post-it problem clouds into your syllabus where they match the course content. Take a few minutes at the beginning of the next class to introduce the new syllabus. Point out exactly how and when they will acquire the skills to address their biggest problems and fears during your course.

You have co-created a syllabus with your students!

Takeaways

There are five reasons we love this exercise:

1. Students have never experienced anything like it…and they love it. They’re having fun, brainstorming, moving around the class, creating big messy Post-It clouds on the wall, making connections with classmates, and they’re getting to talk about their challenges with someone who genuinely cares (you).
2. Your class will stand out. How many professors take the time to listen to their students, and adapt their course to ensure it’s relevant to the people sitting in the room? You’ll let your students know from the get-go, that this class is going to be special, impactful and helpful.
3. Increasing engagement. Not on will they love this exercise, you’ll know exactly what to say to engage your students in future exercises. You’ll simply refer to the problems you outlined together and describe how they exercise you’re about to do will help them solve the problems you brainstormed together.
4. It will change the way you relate to your students. By understanding their challenges, you’ll empathize and connect on a more substantive level than you would otherwise. That connection will magnify your impact.
5. You’re modeling a problem-oriented approach with your students; the same kind of relationship you want them to have with their customers. They’ll see you practicing what you preach, and how empowering it is for both the “entrepreneur” (you) and the “customers” (them).

[bctt tweet=”Engage entrepreneurship students by turning their problems into your syllabus.” via=”no”]

Co-Create your Syllabus Lesson Plan

We’ve created an experiential, 45-minute lesson plan to help you co-create your entrepreneurship syllabus with your syllabus. It encapsulates everything we’ve talked about above, in a handy editable document.

Click here for your editable copy

All we ask is that you leave us some feedback on it the comments below so we can improve it!

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What’s Next?

In an upcoming post, we will share an exercise that will give your students an opportunity to launch a product in 60 minutes!  Please subscribe here to get that post in your inbox.

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