Blog Entry #1

This week in college has been interesting in that I have been reading the materials on teaching while comparing the readings with all of my teachers styles and analyzing that as much as the course material.

The most useful things that I have gathered from the readings include:

• One of the most important things from the reading in my opinion was the small tips given in First Day to Final Grade. Most people already have a general idea about making lesson plans and a syllabus from classes that we have taken, but small things like getting to know the room layout beforehand or learning the pros and cons of how to dress.

• I thought it was an unwritten rule that everything on the first day needed to be very serious and businesslike, but the book suggests that you don't need to be to rigid, but it also warns that it isn't easy to undo things once a mistake on decorum is encountered.

• The class planning from the Teaching Tips book was thorough and helpful if you have the time to actually follow that plan. Many of the Grad. student teachers that I know in our department were not informed early enough to implement that level of planning. A modified timetable could be used for similar results when there is uncertainty or fluidity in the teaching schedule. That said most of the teaching assignments in Biology are lab instructors. Labs are usually fairly standard with little variation from the lab manual.

As I hinted at earlier Biology is a little different from many of the other departments when it comes to Graduate Students teaching.

• While there is little leeway in labs for much deviation with regard to the syllabus or overall plan of the course, the reading did have useful information on introducing yourself and getting to know the students. In general Biology classes are a little more laid back when it comes to labs. There is a small amount of lecture and then self guided learning from lab books, so TAs tend to be more informal. Getting to know the students is very important for this. This can be done with icebreakers or having the students fill out information cards.

• In an actual lecture format in Biology there are a lot of facts that do need to be imparted on the students unfortunately. It can lead to classes being long and boring. I like the idea of having discussions interspersed throughout the semester in places where Bioethics can be discussed. Again this raises difficulties in many Biology classes, at least at NDSU, because many of our science classes have more than 50 people. It is difficult to get large groups to interact.

While reading I have been taking note of several things that I want to do when I start teaching.

• The first thing that I have already started on is getting to know the administrative staff in Stevens Hall. The are all very friendly and helpful.

• I have been collecting amusing and entertaining videos from YouTube that can really liven up a lecture while still teaching boring things like protein synthesis.

• Icebreakers are always important, but I have always felt really silly whenever I needed to do one of these in class. I like the idea of straight up telling the students that this will be corny and explaining why we are going to do it anyway.

There was a lot of good information in the books, but I found that there is a lot of fun stuff online that you can do to make a class more interesting and get people involved even when the information is dry. There is a good site at http://www.educationworld.com/ that has a lot of good icebreakers. There is always www.YouTube.com as well. I recommend the Protein Synthesis-An Epic on the Cellular Level for anybody interested in science.