As lies go, grades are one of the more interesting ones. They claim to reflect our aptitude, but cannot even approach real measures of character. Ability to integrate or balance chemical equations crumbles in the face of courage, strength of heart, or love. Yet an average university inhabitant will bite your head off for those few extra points. Some are more creature-like then others, hoarding points as if it was some treasure, losing sight of what these numbers represent. In a way grades are like credit, or a promise, you can trade it in for future opportunities. My 4.0 GPA says that I can run a business or put together a car, even though I have done neither.
I first taught 26 students. “This is an appropriate number of students” I said, we should not have any more. “I do not think I have room in my heart for more”. Now I teach 64 and the past few hours, totaling their grades, just seem so futile. I want to feel like I gave them something special, but it seems that most would rather trade any real connection for those few extra points.
- There is really no need to stress about teaching as few students as you can. Do not worry about that. Even though many may be attending your lectures, I can bet my salary that you are teaching a small subset only.
- Try to cram all your teaching into one day. It is horrible how effective teaching is at destroying productivity. You are there (grad school) to do research (think) and write, anything else is unproductive (in the eyes of the P.I.) use of your time.
- You never want to grade for correctness, grade for completeness instead. There is no problem you can write that will enlighten students more then a good explanation/example from you. So do not bother, let exams take care of the grades.
- When doing multiple lectures a week, your first one will be the worst (that’s when you will make most of your mistakes), your third or fourth one will be better (that’s when you will fix your mistakes). Teaching between 3pm-4:30pm is rough.
- E-mail is great; it allows all of your 200 students to contact you at any hour of the day or night (apparently students do not sleep). See what I did there. Students have weekly access to you, make them use it.
- You do not need to know everything, do not be afraid to send them to the prof. It is better to tell your ego to take a breather and turn a student or two away, then give them faulty or incomplete information. They will benefit from it, and most importantly you will be in the clear when they mess that question up on an exam.
Above are only a few guidelines that I have collected from my few teaching cycles. As a TA, your goal should be simplicity. You need to make everything as uncomplicated as possible. This will decrease your error numbers dramatically. Plus professors love when things are easy. Last thing; be on the look out for that “AHA” moment from your students (blow their little brains away). You will get a few worth teaching for every dozen or so.
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