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Things I learned from teaching

claytonwramsey.github.io

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Re: Things I learned from teaching

#41

Post by d0gsg0w00f »

z3dd wrote: post #7
shae wrote: post #2

I went back to uni after a 15 year career writing software. I attended the all the office hours for all my classes. Instructors went from shocked to excited, and I learned so much!

I think 18-24 is just way too young for most people to study at a university (at least math/physics-based ones). I don't have a better solution, but only about 6-7 years after graduating I realized I would then have enjoyed these classes and learned from them much much more.

I dropped out of uni when I was 19. Worked for about 5 years doing low skilled labor. This sent me back to school on my own dime with a fire inside to finish. For my personality type this worked well for me. I have to really buy into something before I put my heart into it.

The only reason I wouldn't recommend this approach is that working full time and going to school was brutal.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#42

Post by justinclift »

placebo wrote: post #27
lysecret wrote: post #22

I used to work as a teacher in a kind of bootcamp. Over the years my my view on teaching has changed massively. I think there are only two generic things and the rest is situation dependent. - There is just no way around the struggle. The students have to struggle. Your job is not to take the struggle away but to show them why it is worth struggling and instil the belief that they can do it. - The most important teac…

Although there is no way around the struggle, there is a way around how the struggle is perceived and experienced. A good teacher shows the struggle is worth it, but I believe a great teacher makes the struggle something you enjoy doing, and not something you have to put up with so you can enjoy the compensation at some point in the future.

> I believe a great teacher makes the struggle something you enjoy doing

What's a good example of this? :)

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#43

Post by jalapenos »

sethammons wrote: post #28
lysecret wrote: post #22

I used to work as a teacher in a kind of bootcamp. Over the years my my view on teaching has changed massively. I think there are only two generic things and the rest is situation dependent. - There is just no way around the struggle. The students have to struggle. Your job is not to take the struggle away but to show them why it is worth struggling and instil the belief that they can do it. - The most important teac…

> Forced attendance is imo the worst symptom of this I taught in an inner city title one school. While it would have made teaching those who showed up easier, I'd bet that over half the students would not show up without forced attendance. We had under 2% of students who would go on to graduate a four year college and something like an 80% transitory rate (meaning 20% would complete all four years at the school - thi…

Get them into trades that can make them money right now rather than calling textbooks & college the OnlyWay™?

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#44

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

sethammons wrote: post #35
lysecret wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, first of all, I truly respect this kind of teaching work. My only experience is in graduate or post-graduate level teaching. So really don't what is ideal in your situation.

fwiw I've never heard of forced attendance post secondary; attendance is a legal requirement in k-12.

In Spain it became common after the last university reform, about 15 years ago. IMO it's counterproductive. If a student doesn't want to go to class and you force them, they probably won't be paying attention but just wasting time with social networks or whatever other distraction, and they can even distract those that want to attend. And I don't even feel morally justified to tell them to stop wasting time (as long as they're silent, at least) if they're forced to be there.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#45

Post by Solvency »

jalapenos wrote: post #43
sethammons wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Forced attendance is imo the worst symptom of this I taught in an inner city title one school. While it would have made teaching those who showed up easier, I'd bet that over half the students would not show up without forced attendance. We had under 2% of students who would go on to graduate a four year college and something like an 80% transitory rate (meaning 20% would complete all four years at the school - thi…

Get them into trades that can make them money right now rather than calling textbooks & college the OnlyWay™?

Err, wrong. We must feed the industrial debt complex.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#46

Post by iteria »

jalapenos wrote: post #43
sethammons wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Forced attendance is imo the worst symptom of this I taught in an inner city title one school. While it would have made teaching those who showed up easier, I'd bet that over half the students would not show up without forced attendance. We had under 2% of students who would go on to graduate a four year college and something like an 80% transitory rate (meaning 20% would complete all four years at the school - thi…

Get them into trades that can make them money right now rather than calling textbooks & college the OnlyWay™?

Even with trades you need to know how to read, write and do basic math (and honestly algebra). Kids who don't show up likely haven't hopped that hurdle and are unfit even for trades. There is a disconnect where kids dont understand that classes are often not about the class but some underlying skill you're practicing via something they consider worthless.

It's a waste for schools to put an unprepared kid in a trade class only for them to realize oh. They actually have zero skills for that. And then backtrack. You'll also never convince most kids that they'll need algebra for a trade because most people can't connect that you need algebra to budget and other basics of life.

Vocational track was a thing when I was a kid. And it didn't matter much because kids who could do it were capable of doing college track if they wanted and kids who could nevet do collegr track and needed mandatory attendance couldn't even read. Maybe the gap is narrower these days, but i don't think a vocational track is encourages the bottom. I do think it's a good thing to expose kids as an option, just to explain that nowadays even trades require schooling after high school if you want to get certified, etc. It's just shorter with more lab type classes a la engineering.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#47

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

kettleballroll wrote: post #32
NotOscarWilde wrote: post #23

The author writes about himself: > Hi! I'm a PhD student studying computer science at Rice University. This means that we are on the same career path (I am currently an assistant professor in theoretical CS in Europe). I wish you of course best of luck! Here is the harshest truth about teaching I learned during my PhD: If you are focusing on teaching too much, you are setting yourself up for failure. This sounds crue…

Just as a counterpoint: this very much depends. I probably spent at least a year (probably more) of my PhD (in Europe) just teaching a class I built up from the ground up myself. I barely got any research done the first year I gave that class, and every subsequent year it still took a large chunk of my time. It's part of the reason I spent a total of 7 years doing a PhD (which is long, considering I already had an MS…

> I had a blast and found that teaching helped me understand the fundamentals of my fields at an extremely deep level that I'd never reached otherwise

You spent 5 years teaching a class that, judging from your words, you probably prepared and improved very thoroughly. That is a lot of hours of work. Are you sure if you devoted all those hours to reading textbooks, papers, doing experiments, etc. on your field, you wouldn't have achieved an even deeper understanding?

Maybe yes, but if so, I honestly think you're in a minority. As an academic myself, I like teaching and I do learn things from it, but it's far from the most efficient way to learn a scientific field. If I had a pure research position I'm pretty sure that my research productivity would be better.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#48

Post by kcplate »

jalapenos wrote: post #43
sethammons wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Forced attendance is imo the worst symptom of this I taught in an inner city title one school. While it would have made teaching those who showed up easier, I'd bet that over half the students would not show up without forced attendance. We had under 2% of students who would go on to graduate a four year college and something like an 80% transitory rate (meaning 20% would complete all four years at the school - thi…

Get them into trades that can make them money right now rather than calling textbooks & college the OnlyWay™?

Amen to this. Frankly i would go a step further and say that any student that doesn’t show a real interest and propensity for STEM should be equally encouraged and introduced to trade school and apprenticeship options as well as college with equal emphasis.

You will serve those students better and society as a whole.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#49

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

NotOscarWilde wrote: post #23

The author writes about himself: > Hi! I'm a PhD student studying computer science at Rice University. This means that we are on the same career path (I am currently an assistant professor in theoretical CS in Europe). I wish you of course best of luck! Here is the harshest truth about teaching I learned during my PhD: If you are focusing on teaching too much, you are setting yourself up for failure. This sounds crue…

> However, at least in my neck of the woods (i.e. Europe), almost all gates and gatekeepers for you as a PhD student, and later postdoc, are checking your research.

While I'm also in Europe, my bet is that this is universal and won't change in the foreseeable future.

The reason is that teaching is practically impossible to evaluate. How do you quantitatively measure which professors provide high-quality teaching? By grades? No, easiest course wins. By employability? No, it depends a lot on the field, a philosophy professor can be amazing but that won't create jobs in philosophy. Student polls? Correlation with actual quality is really weak, and I say this as someone who has good polls - there is a strong influence of difficulty as well as the subject itself (a CS student will almost always prefer programming to physics, and it's not the physics professor's fault), apart from gender bias.

In my country they try to give an equal weight to teaching equally with respect to research in applications for positiosn and tenure, but since there is no realistic metric, the bulk of the score ends up being about "years teaching" or "number of hours taught" which is the only objective number that they can come up with. So it becomes basically a seniority factor and since your seniority is what it is and preparing high-quality lectures won't give you more hours or years, the outcome is still that focusing too much on teaching is bad for your career.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#50

Post by schneems »

bluenose69 wrote: post #29

Here are some things I tell young professors: 1. The students are not like you. For you, the topic is fascinating, and something you've pondered for much of your adult life. For the average student, the topic is moderately interesting, and likely quite confusing, in the first exposure that is this class. 2. Teach to the middle of the class. Be aware that the weakest students will be perplexed much of the time, and th…

> Now we ready for the exciting part" or "This next bit is what I like best about this topic", etc.

Personal excitement for the material is one piece, but it’s not enough. The most important thing a teacher should do is help the students internalize *why* they’re learning the material. What they can do with it.

Baking shows don’t start off telling the history of the maillard reaction, they show you the delicious cake you’re going to make. Then you make the cake. Then (if it’s a class and not the food network) you learn the important details.

Teaching is storytelling. The main character is the student. What challenge will they overcome? How will they grow as a result? If the teacher makes them hungry to know the answer, then students will not just tolerate the information, they’ll seek it out, challenge it, and ask for more.

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