PSTUM-list December 2005

pstum-list@lists.fas.harvard.edu

4 participants
9 discussions

Teaching and More General Professional Development (was: Support for TAs Currently Teaching at U. Northern Colorado)

by Bruff, Derek O

Shandy, > f) Seminars or courses on teaching and pedagogy - > 1 hour/week seminar on college teaching (course coordination) > required for all TAs AND instructors every term, by course. > In my case, these meet face-to-face every other week and > on-line through Black Board in alternate weeks, with assigned > discussion activities (e.g., college algebra teachers meet in > person on the 1st and 3rd Wednesday of each month, liberal > arts math instructors meet in person 2nd and 4th Wednesday of > each month, ALL meet face to face when there is a 5th > Wednesday in the month). An additional hour-long seminar is > required during the first semester teaching (only new TAs in > this smaller seminar, 4-6 per Fall term). This new TA > seminar is about being a college faculty member. Students > write and rewrite a teaching philosophy (later a teaching and > learning philosophy) statement, create a c.v., discuss > expectations for academic faculty AND talk about classroom > mechanics and student learning. It sounds like your new TA seminar blends teaching preparation with career development. I imagine that's the case in a fair number of departments. Math departments spend a lot of time and resources improving their graduate students' mathematics research skills. They often spend comparatively little time and resources on other aspects of their graduate students' professional development, including mathematicians' roles as teachers, members of departments, members of universities, and members of their profession. When they do attend to broader professional development issues, it's often done in conjunction with attention to teaching skills. This makes sense to me, but I think it's unfortunate that teaching development often has to piggyback on professional development or vice versa. Both areas of development are important in their own right. Derek -- Derek Bruff, Ph.D. Assistant Director, Vanderbilt Center for Teaching 116 Calhoun Hall / Box 351537, Station B Nashville, TN 37235 615-322-7290 / www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/

18 years, 4 months

Student Course Evaluations (was: Support for TAs Currently Teaching at U. Northern Colorado)

by Bruff, Derek O

Shandy, > d) Collecting feedback (either via evaluation forms or > student interviews) from the TA's students and reviewing it > with the TA - Open-ended response mid-term evaluations are > required from all TAs for each section they teach; 1st year > TAs review these with me (Course Coordinator), other TAs and > instructors can review them with me if they want (happens > about 25% of the time). TAs report anecdotally on their > office hour interactions with their students but the culture > in the department has a long way to go before they will apply > the math ed research theories and methods they are learning > in their graduate courses to their own teaching. Mind you, I > tend to work only with first- and second-year TAs and many > have not taken much math ed by the time I have them. For > many, the idea that teaching and learning are different > things is a major slap in the face of long-held belief. As > course coordinator I consider my work with new college > instructors a success if they have internalized the need to > attend to student learning by the end of the year. It may be > that as TAs move into teaching higher level math courses they > DO become more active investigators of their own teaching and > their students' learning. The course coordination for > calculus and higher is done by mathematicians who are NOT > researchers in math ed, though, so TAs are not encouraged by > those coordinators to investigate student learning. > I think there are two separate issues involved here that may be harder to separate in a math ed department than in a math department. One is summarized by Angelo & Cross' quote, "Teaching without learning is just talking." That's the realization that if the students aren't learning anything, then one's teaching isn't effective. This relates to course evaluations in that one way (not the only way) of knowing if student learning is taking place is to (surprise!) ask the students. I'll agree with you that TAs (even those in math ed programs) don't always get that the point of the whole teaching enterprise is student learning. There's a great article on the development of TAs as teachers by Jody Nyquist and Jo Sprague in "The Professional Development of Graduate Teaching Assistants" (Anker, 1998) that puts the goal of "Are my students getting it?" at the third of three stages of TA development. However, if a TA gets that student learning is indeed the point of teaching, then that adds a lot of value to the gathering and analysis of student course evaluations. The other issue is the idea of using math education methodologies to answer the question, "Are my students getting it?" I would expect that it might take a while for math ed grad students to warm up to that idea--I don't have experience with math ed grad students, so I don't know. However, I would expect that it would take mathematics grad students even longer to warm up to that idea, since they don't receive any training in educational methodologies. However, I think the gathering and analysis of student course evaluations can be performed and can be valuable in the absence of the use of other education methodologies. Derek -- Derek Bruff, Ph.D. Assistant Director, Vanderbilt Center for Teaching 116 Calhoun Hall / Box 351537, Station B Nashville, TN 37235 615-322-7290 / www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/

18 years, 4 months

Videotaping One's Teaching (was: Support for TAs Currently Teaching at U. Northern Colorado)

by Bruff, Derek O

Shandy, > c) Videotaping the TA's teaching and having the TA watch the > tape with someone - Almost never. The self-protective > response is very difficult to negotiate (particularly for me > when working with male TAs). However, we are developing > IRB-released pieces of video of people teaching to use for > case study. As mentioned earlier on this list, a national > group of us are writing a CCLI grant proposal to gather such > video and create accompanying materials (pre-viewing > questions, writing prompts, discussion prompts) for eventual > national dissemination. Each of the teaching centers where I've worked offered confidential videotape consultation services to faculty and TAs. Watching a videotape of one's teaching with a neutral third party (such as a teaching center consultant) can be an effective way of reflecting on one's teaching that one often can't do in the "heat of the moment," so to speak, in the classroom. It's particularly effective in math classes at helping teachers improve their presentation and boardwork skills, which are often difficulties for very novice teachers. I've found that graduate students are typically more willing to be videotaped than more experienced faculty. Your video project sounds very interesting. I hope your proposal is funded--I can think of many uses for such a collection. Derek -- Derek Bruff, Ph.D. Assistant Director, Vanderbilt Center for Teaching 116 Calhoun Hall / Box 351537, Station B Nashville, TN 37235 615-322-7290 / www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/

18 years, 4 months

Teaching Observations (was: Support for TAs Currently Teaching at U. Northern Colorado)

by Bruff, Derek O

Shandy, What a great set of support activities for new TAs. Thanks so much for sharing. I have a few comments and questions about particular activities, but this is getting long, so I think I'll break my post into particular sub-topics. Hopefully that will encourage further conversation! > > a) Observations of the TA's teaching by faculty members, with > feedback to the TA - As Course Coordinator for College > Algebra and Liberal Arts Mathematics I have the TAs and term > faculty teaching these courses observe each other AND I > observe each person at least once. In each case, the > instructor 1. chooses an observation form appropriate for her > or his teaching style (we have a BlackBoard site with several > forms and links to other resources for forms), 2. meets with > the observer (in person or via email) to say what the > observee would like the observer to focus on during the > observation 3. is observed for a full class period 4. meets > with the observer for a debriefing (5-10 minutes) immediately > after the class session 5. meets with the observer to go over > the observer's signed write-up of the observation. I think that observations like these can be very important. If you were to look at the educational backgrounds of math and math ed graduate students, I would expect that you would find relatively few of them took classes like the one's we have them teach as TAs--pre-calculus and calculus classes for non-majors. (Those of you who do research on TA experiences--any research to back up this claim of mine?) As a result, many of them haven't seen good teaching (or even poor teaching!) in these teaching settings. They don't have experience with models of good teaching they can emulate. Having such TAs observe more experienced teachers teaching these kinds of courses can go a long way to overcoming this lack of experience. I also like that you give your observers forms to use to guide their observations. This type of structured reflection by the observer adds so much value to the process. Would you mind sharing some or all of your forms on the TA Professional Development Wiki hosted at the Better File Cabinet (http://betterfilecabinet.com/cgi-bin/ta/index.cgi?HomePage)? I've just added a page on "Training and Support Activities" that could benefit from your observation forms. Derek -- Derek Bruff, Ph.D. Assistant Director, Vanderbilt Center for Teaching 116 Calhoun Hall / Box 351537, Station B Nashville, TN 37235 615-322-7290 / www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/

18 years, 4 months

RE: [PSTUM-list] PSTUM Listserv

by Bruff, Derek O

Eric, Thanks for letting us know about the Consortium of TA Developers listserv. Do you have a sense if the TA developers on the listserv are primarily housed in academic departments or in centers for teaching and learning? I ask because one of the reasons I started the PSTUM listserv is that there were a number of TA and faculty developers who resided *within mathematics departments* and weren't experiencing the kind of community and collaboration I knew was present (via POD and other organizations) for TA and faculty developers who resided in centers for teaching. I've been lucky enough to live in both worlds (math departments and centers for teaching), but I get the impression that's not often the case. Thanks again for mentioning this. I think there's fertile ground for connections between those doing department- and discipline-based TA and faculty development and those doing similar work outside departments. Derek -- Derek Bruff, Ph.D. Assistant Director, Vanderbilt Center for Teaching 116 Calhoun Hall / Box 351537, Station B Nashville, TN 37235 615-322-7290 / www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/ -----Original Message----- From: pstum-list-bounces(a)lists.fas.harvard.edu [mailto:pstum-list-bounces@lists.fas.harvard.edu] On Behalf Of Eric Kristensen Sent: Monday, December 12, 2005 1:34 PM To: 'Preparing and Supporting Teachers of Undergraduate Mathematics' Subject: RE: [PSTUM-list] PSTUM Listserv Dear Derek, I know that you set up this list with STEM disciplines in mind. For those that are interested in a broader discussion of supporting TA's in their various roles at universities across North America, I might suggest taking a look at the Consortium of TA Developers list sponsored by the University of Guelph and hosted by Trevor Holmes, Educational Development Associate at Guelph's Teaching Support Service. This list was developed from conversations on the STLHE and POD lists. If you wish, you may subscribe by sending a message to listerv(a)listserv.uoguelph.ca containing the following information: SUB CTAD <full_name> At times the discussion is lively, at times it is minimal. It is there for people's needs; if you have a question or concern about TA and grad student development, feel free to post! Answers usually come in pretty quickly.... All the best, Eric _______________________________________________ PSTUM-list mailing list PSTUM-list(a)lists.fas.harvard.edu http://lists.fas.harvard.edu/mailman/listinfo/pstum-list

18 years, 4 months

Support for TAs Currently Teaching at U. Northern Colorado

by Hauk, Shandy

In response to Derek's post, I offer the answers for the current state of things for me as coordinator of teaching for two service courses in my department. Question: What kind of support do you offer math TAs during the semesters in which they teach, particularly those who are teaching for the first time? Have you found any of the following methods of support useful and, if so, why? a) Observations of the TA's teaching by faculty members, with feedback to the TA - As Course Coordinator for College Algebra and Liberal Arts Mathematics I have the TAs and term faculty teaching these courses observe each other AND I observe each person at least once. In each case, the instructor 1. chooses an observation form appropriate for her or his teaching style (we have a BlackBoard site with several forms and links to other resources for forms), 2. meets with the observer (in person or via email) to say what the observee would like the observer to focus on during the observation 3. is observed for a full class period 4. meets with the observer for a debriefing (5-10 minutes) immediately after the class session 5. meets with the observer to go over the observer's signed write-up of the observation. If the instructor is okay with the write-up, he or she signs it. If not, then the observer and instructor discuss the observations and their expression until both are satisfied. The final observation report is signed by both. Only the observation conducted by me or another full-time faculty member goes in the instructor/TAs file. The other observations are for the instructor and for me as Course Coordinator. Instructors (TA and term) have reported this to be nerve-wracking at first, but also report that after the second or third observation they actually like seeing others teach and being seen teaching. b) Observations of the TA's teaching by other TAs, with feedback to the TA - see above, at least once per term. c) Videotaping the TA's teaching and having the TA watch the tape with someone - Almost never. The self-protective response is very difficult to negotiate (particularly for me when working with male TAs). However, we are developing IRB-released pieces of video of people teaching to use for case study. As mentioned earlier on this list, a national group of us are writing a CCLI grant proposal to gather such video and create accompanying materials (pre-viewing questions, writing prompts, discussion prompts) for eventual national dissemination. d) Collecting feedback (either via evaluation forms or student interviews) from the TA's students and reviewing it with the TA - Open-ended response mid-term evaluations are required from all TAs for each section they teach; 1st year TAs review these with me (Course Coordinator), other TAs and instructors can review them with me if they want (happens about 25% of the time). TAs report anecdotally on their office hour interactions with their students but the culture in the department has a long way to go before they will apply the math ed research theories and methods they are learning in their graduate courses to their own teaching. Mind you, I tend to work only with first- and second-year TAs and many have not taken much math ed by the time I have them. For many, the idea that teaching and learning are different things is a major slap in the face of long-held belief. As course coordinator I consider my work with new college instructors a success if they have internalized the need to attend to student learning by the end of the year. It may be that as TAs move into teaching higher level math courses they DO become more active investigators of their own teaching and their students' learning. The course coordination for calculus and higher is done by mathematicians who are NOT researchers in math ed, though, so TAs are not encouraged by those coordinators to investigate student learning. e) Having the TA give a practice version of an upcoming lecture in front of other TAs, faculty members, or actual students - Happens during TA training in the summer before first teaching; small teaching vignette practice also occasionally done during face-to-face Course Coordination meetings. f) Seminars or courses on teaching and pedagogy - 1 hour/week seminar on college teaching (course coordination) required for all TAs AND instructors every term, by course. In my case, these meet face-to-face every other week and on-line through Black Board in alternate weeks, with assigned discussion activities (e.g., college algebra teachers meet in person on the 1st and 3rd Wednesday of each month, liberal arts math instructors meet in person 2nd and 4th Wednesday of each month, ALL meet face to face when there is a 5th Wednesday in the month). An additional hour-long seminar is required during the first semester teaching (only new TAs in this smaller seminar, 4-6 per Fall term). This new TA seminar is about being a college faculty member. Students write and rewrite a teaching philosophy (later a teaching and learning philosophy) statement, create a c.v., discuss expectations for academic faculty AND talk about classroom mechanics and student learning. g) Regular meetings for TAs associated with a particular course to discuss teaching matters - see above. h) Other ideas? - TA buddies. When instructors first meet I have each person pair up with at least one other person who can cover their class for them if they must miss it. We go over the etiquette of requesting another person to teach one's class and the imperative that classes are NEVER cancelled. Derek -- Derek Bruff, Ph.D. Assistant Director, Vanderbilt Center for Teaching 116 Calhoun Hall / Box 351537, Station B Nashville, TN 37235 615-322-7290 / www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/

18 years, 4 months

PSTUM Listserv

by Bruff, Derek O

PSTUM List, It has once again been several months since the Preparing and Supporting Teachers of Undergraduate Mathematics (PSTUM) listserv has seen any traffic. I've been busy with my new position at the Vanderbilt Center for Teaching and haven't been able to see the list with questions as much as I would have liked. I started this list in part because of the sense of community and sharing of ideas I've found on the POD Listerv (http://listserv.nd.edu/archives/pod.html <http://listserv.nd.edu/archives/pod.html> ), the listserv for members of the Professional & Organizational Development Network--a professional group for people like me who work with faculty to develop and refine their teaching skills. It seems to me that too many of us who are training TAs and helping math faculty improve their teaching do so without relying on the experiences and good ideas of colleagues at other institutions. I hope you'll see this listserv as one way of not having to "reinvent" the wheel when it comes to TA and faculty development at your school. To that end, see my next posting for a question to get the conversation rolling again. Derek -- Derek Bruff, Ph.D. Assistant Director, Vanderbilt Center for Teaching 116 Calhoun Hall / Box 351537, Station B Nashville, TN 37235 615-322-7290 / www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/

18 years, 4 months

Joanne Nakonechny is out of the office.

by Joanne Nakonechny

18 years, 4 months

Support for TAs Currently Teaching

by Bruff, Derek O

PSTUM List, What kind of support do you offer math TAs during the semesters in which they teach, particularly those who are teaching for the first time? Have you found any of the following methods of support useful and, if so, why? a) Observations of the TA's teaching by faculty members, with feedback to the TA b) Observations of the TA's teaching by other TAs, with feedback to the TA c) Videotaping the TA's teaching and having the TA watch the tape with someone d) Collecting feedback (either via evaluation forms or student interviews) from the TA's students and reviewing it with the TA e) Having the TA give a practice version of an upcoming lecture in front of other TAs, faculty members, or actual students f) Seminars or courses on teaching and pedagogy g) Regular meetings for TAs associated with a particular course to discuss teaching matters h) Other ideas? Derek -- Derek Bruff, Ph.D. Assistant Director, Vanderbilt Center for Teaching 116 Calhoun Hall / Box 351537, Station B Nashville, TN 37235 615-322-7290 / www.vanderbilt.edu/cft/

18 years, 4 months

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PSTUM-list December 2005