19 Dec
2005
19 Dec
'05
5:28 p.m.
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/