Things I learned from teaching • Hacker News Board

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#91

Post by shortrounddev2 » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:03 PM UTC

schneems wrote: post #50

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…

> 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.

Depending on the topic there is often no "why". Most classes a student takes are required and they have absolutely zero interest in them and they will willfully forget them as soon as the semester is over

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#92

Post by jmrm » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:11 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #44

sethammons wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

From experience, in the last 5-10 years most lecturers won't care if you go to classes or no. The will only require you to do continuous evaluation tasks.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#93

Post by bee_rider » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:15 PM UTC

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.

I’ve taken and assisted for classes that had “mandatory” attendance. In the sense that missing classes would come out of your grade.

Sometimes it was implemented as a direct role-call. Some classes have a “participation” component which is really just a fuzzy attendance grade. Some classes have random graded in-class quizzes, which also function as a stochastic attendance check.

Generally I hate all of these things IMO low attendance is the instructor’s last, most dramatic barometer to indicate poor instruction, and subverting this measurement is a terrible idea. But it is definitely different for k-12!

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#94

Post by bee_rider » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:22 PM UTC

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…

I think most of the people here (myself included) only have experience teaching at a university level (since it is a website for tech professionals, most of us only have teaching experience in grad school or as professors). So the scenario is just totally different. Mandatory attendance doesn’t make sense for adults that are supposed to be trusted to make their own decision and who are paying lots of money to be there (If people don’t show up to my discussion section, it is a sign I’m failing paying customers, and I need to sort that out, so forcing them to attend will destroy my measurement).

If you are teaching k-12 and especially if some of the kids have a rough situation outside of the school, at least mandatory attendance puts them in an environment insulated from those outside pressures.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#95

Post by nonameiguess » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:23 PM UTC

schneems wrote: post #50

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…

At least some of the time the reason is the canon of that subject requires it and you either care about that subject or you don't. If it's a distribution requirement the school imposes or the student simply doesn't know yet what they enjoy studying and are still major-shopping, there isn't necessarily much a professor can do about that. It's not like cooking. Everyone has to eat. Not everyone needs to become a chemist, but if at some point you think you might want to become one, you're going to have to learn common foundational material that all chemists must know to succeed as chemists. If you end up not actually becoming a chemist, it will never be useful to you.

Or if you're pre-med, it still may never be useful to you to learn all the different ways atoms can arrange themselves into molecules unless you're going to someday do novel drug research, but medical school admissions and clinical licensing boards have not yet figured out a way to craft pre-requisites based on the specific unknowable future paths of individual applicants and they have to require everything that might be needed by any kind of doctor.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#96

Post by justinclift » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:25 PM UTC

hackermailman wrote: post #86

justinclift wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I believe a great teacher makes the struggle something you enjoy doing What's a good example of this? :)

Flipped classroom style maybe. Lectures are prerecorded then you as a group struggle with the problem sets in class. A few schools have entire courses for learning the struggle like MITs freshman problem solving course for figuring out Puerto Rico's power grid problems you are given some small area to research yourself and bring that to your student meetings and struggle to a solution. https://terrascope.mit.edu/next…

Thanks, that looks like a good approach. :)

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#97

Post by Upvoter33 » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:33 PM UTC

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…

This is good advice - it is good to keep all of these things in mind.

I would add: Let them see you sweat a bit. When they see you are working hard to make a great class for them, they too put in more work.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#98

Post by tomcam » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:45 PM UTC

> I was teaching a blow-off class… only about half of my students were really paying attention at a time, which is pretty bad if you want them to actually learn anything.

I think most teachers would consider half the students paying attention to be a roaring success.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#99

Post by kmoser » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:48 PM UTC

shortrounddev2 wrote: post #91

schneems wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

> 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. Depending on the topic there is often no "why". Most classes a student takes are required and they have absolutely zero interest in them and they will willfully forget them as soon as the semester is over

There is always a "why", else what would be the use of teaching the subject in the first place, even to enthusiastic students?

OP's point is that helping the students understand the "why" might spark interest in them. Even if you reach one kid, you will have achieved your intended result.

Re: Things I learned from teaching

#100

Post by SamoyedFurFluff » Sun, Dec 10, 2023, 6:51 PM UTC

kmoser wrote: post #99

shortrounddev2 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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. Depending on the topic there is often no "why". Most classes a student takes are required and they have absolutely zero interest in them and they will willfully forget them as soon as the semester is over

There is always a "why", else what would be the use of teaching the subject in the first place, even to enthusiastic students? OP's point is that helping the students understand the "why" might spark interest in them. Even if you reach one kid, you will have achieved your intended result.

The why the course is useful to know may not actually ever be relevant to the students why they’re taking the class, and no amount of informing the student how it’s useful will assist them. Knowing firsthand the value of tax knowledge doesn’t mean I have any level of enthusiasm about my taxes…

Btw, for your baking example: the great British bake off is a wildly popular show and yet almost none of the people I know who are fans care to even try to learn baking themselves. I just don’t think it’s a think that happens to any degree you think it does.