Be Explicit About Why
As an expert, it is clear to you as the instructor why you choose to cover or omit topics, how class activities support student learning, and that the assignments you give students provide opportunity to practice or demonstrate knowledge around the course learning goals and outcomes. However, for a student, those connections are rarely as clear. Making a habit of explicitly explaining how the lecture topic supports the course goals, or how engaging in a group project provides applied application of skills engages students and encourages them to be more active participants in your course and in their learning.
Create a Unified Course Schedule
It is very common in traditional courses for many of the course elements to be separated—the topic schedule is in one place, the course goals in another, and the assignment due dates in yet another location. To create a clearer picture of what students need to focus on, know, and or do, consider creating a single table that outlines all the course elements. To take a page from online instructional design, this attention to a clear and unified approach is considered best practice and contributes to student focus and positive experiences (Bristol & Zerwekh, 2011).
In this example, you can see the difference between just listing topics, learning goals, and due dates and putting them together in a way that helps students see the purpose of your topics, and how their prep work and assignments support the learning goals.