Simple Syllabus: Navigating a Syllabus

Updated on Sep 15, 2025

About

It's time to unlock your syllabus' full potential. This easy-to-follow walk-through will assist with efficiently navigating and locating critical information found in your syllabus.

If you first need to locate and view your syllabus, please see one of these guides before continuing: Simple Syllabus: How to Access and View a Syllabus in D2L. or Simple Syllabus: How to Access and View a Syllabus in the Simple Syllabus Dashboard.

1. Open and View a Simple Syllabus.

Once you have accessed your syllabus for the first time, the syllabus acknowledgment statement will read, "Please read the syllabus. When you have read it in its entirety, please click the acknowledge button." When ready to view the syllabus, click the blue "OK" button.

Image of the Simple Syllabus Acknowledgement statement dialog box.

2. Read your syllabus thoroughly.

Scroll up and down the syllabus, by moving the mouse scroll wheel (PC) or by clicking and dragging the gray scroll track bar on the right side of the syllabus (1).

Alternatively, to use the syllabus navigation panel, click on one of the items listed to the left of the syllabus, such as the "Required Textbook(s)" components shown in the example below (2). Clicking on an item will bring the syllabus screen to that item.

Image of a syllabus with the first annotation pointing to the scroll track bar, and the second annotation pointing to the syllabus navigation panel with a specific item circled in the panel called "Required Textbook(s)," as an example.

To navigate the entire list of items in the panel, click the up or down arrows.

Image of a Simple Syllabus with annotation pointing to the arrows above and below the navigation panel.

3. Search for a specific keyword.

To search for a keyword, click the blue "Quick Search" box.

Image of a Simple Syllabus with annotation pointing to the "Quick Search" button on the lower-left part of the screen.

A box will appear at the top of the syllabus (1).

Fill in a keyword and the syllabus will begin to highlight the word as well as show the first keyword encountered (2).

Use the arrows to the far-right (3) of the keyword search box to navigate to the next highlighted word, or press the "Enter" key (PC) or "Return" key (Mac).

Note the number of words the search has found and the number currently viewed, as indicated by the fraction to the immediate right of the keyword search (4).

$Image of a Simple Syllabus with annotation pointing to the search bar, the keyword item that was searched, the up and down arrows allowing easy navigation to the next keyword instance, and the fraction to the right of the search box that indicates which occurrence of the searched word is displayed.$

To exit the keyword search, click the "X" to the far-right of the search box.

Image of a Simple Syllabus with annotation pointing to the "X" which allows you to close the keyword search.

4. Acknowledging a syllabus.

When reading and scrolling through the syllabus, you may notice some additional text at the bottom that displays the percentage read (1), and ultimately, the Acknowledge button (2).

Image of a Simple Syllabus with annotation pointing to the percentage of the syllabus that has been read and the grayed-out "Acknowledge" button.

Once you have read the syllabus completely, you will see "100% read" appear in the bottom-left part of the screen (1).

When ready, click the blue "Acknowledge" button found on the bottom-right of the screen (2).

Your instructor will be able to see when you have acknowledged the syllabus.

Image of a Simple Syllabus with annotation around "100% read" and the blue "Acknowledge" button.

5. Additional navigation buttons.

To return to the top, click the button on the bottom-right side of the syllabus, labeled "Top" (1).

To receive any updates to this syllabus automatically, click the "Subscribe to Updates" button found on the bottom-left side of the syllabus (2).

Clicking the "My Syllabi" button will return you to the previous screen, where you can view a list of your syllabi.

6. Logging out.

Finally, if you would like to log out of Simple Syllabus, click the "Logout" button on the bottom-left side of the screen. You will then be returned to the login screen.