Helpful Hints for TAs
The Importance of TAs
The work of Teaching Assistants (TAs) is important to a successful
instructional program. From the viewpoint of the Department it is
very important that this task be done effectively. (Indeed,
poor performance in this role can be one factor leading
to loss of financial support.)
From the viewpoint
of the individual TA, this is an opportunity to practice
communication skills, which will be important in your future career
whether you work in university teaching or in industry.
Even at research universities such as Stanford, search committees look for
candidates who combine outstanding scholarly credentials with evidence of
teaching ability. It is not unusual for a job interview to include
a presentation concerning your experience and philosophy of teaching.
Here are some ways you can improve your teaching skills. Some of
these are particularly relevant
if you are involved in leading recitation sections, while others
are useful hints for all TAs.
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Arrange for student evaluations of your teaching and make the most of
them. They can help you learn more about yourself and become a better
teacher.
These evaluations also serve another purpose -- to allow other people to
judge how good you are. Many TAs design their own evaluation forms, but you
might use a standard form instead to provide meaningful numerical data for
future letters of recommendation. TAs are normally not covered under the
University's end-quarter student evaluation system. However, you can use
questionnaires developed by the Center for Teaching and Learning for this
purpose. You can do it in your section or encourage the professor to do it
course-wide. Do it more than once each quarter. If you appear to be trying
to improve, it leaves a favorable impression.
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Take advantage of the Center for Teaching and Learning's videotaping
service. An increasing number of institutions request evidence of teaching
ability; a tape of your class is one way to document your competence.
Consider being taped more than once to judge your progress as an instructor
and to be able to select an example of your teaching at its best. It is free,
confidential, and can be done in the classroom where you teach.
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Holding Office Hours and Grading
Important duties of all TAs are office hours and grading.
TAs are generally expected to hold two or three office hours each week. To
avoid scheduling conflicts, you need to plan your office hours in advance.
Try to choose a combination of times when your students are likely to be free,
but also add that they can make an appointment for other times in order to
accommodate a person who wants to come in but can't make your regular office
hours. Be consistent about keeping the hours you schedule. Leave the office door
open during the office hours, even if no students are currently in your office.
Above all, be courteous to students during office hours. No useful
purpose is served by negative remarks about a question or a
student's level of understanding.
TAs may be asked to hold extra office hours before an exam.
Make a plan for evaluating the students and stick to it. Evaluation
procedures should be decided when the course is in the planning stages.
Meet with your faculty member and other TAs to decide how
many and what kinds of evaluation methods are to be used. Decide how the
students' work should be graded and what proportion of the final mark each
assignment, quiz, etc., will comprise. This is also the time to set out a
policy for missed or failed midterms and late assignments. Once all of these
things have been set out explicitly, make sure the
students are aware of these policies. Tell the class what you expect
from them and
how you plan to measure their progress in achieving the goals of the course.
Explain these goals and how you feel the evaluation procedures and policies
will help to achieve these goals and allow you to evaluate their
progress. Good planning and clear explanations will prevent student confusion
--- and possibly anger --- later on. Sometimes, it may be necessary to
alter the requirements during the quarter. Such a change is only permissible
to make the requirements more lenient, not stricter.
Keep accurate records of your evaluation of each student's performance
throughout the quarter. You should also keep your records around for several
years since students may come back later to question a grade, finish an
incomplete, or ask you to write a recommendation. Such records will make it
easier for you to justify and/or reevaluate a student's final grade if
necessary. Be sure to keep your records in a private directory or file
so they remain confidential.
Occasionally students will dispute a grade. In that case, it is important to
give the student a courteous hearing. You may have added incorrectly, or
overlooked work, or not been able to decipher the writing. If, on the
contrary, the grade should still hold, most students appreciate an explanation
of how the grade accords with the policies you set forth and the manner you
graded the other assignments or exams. Of course the clearer the records you
keep, the easier it will be to reexamine and justify your grades.
Students who ask for a reevaluation of their work should be informed
that the reevaluation can lead to raising, lowering, or no change in
the grade.
Although grading is important, you should
emphasize learning rather than grades. Your class should have
a strict policy on late homeworks,
but be generous with that strict policy. It is more important that
students ultimately learn, even if the homework is late. It serves no
good purpose to
ask for the homework on time when the student hasn't learned the material and
then discourage the student by handing back a low grade on a homework.
Specific Suggestions
- If possible, grade question by question, not paper by paper.
This promotes consistency.
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Do not post students' grades publicly.
They are legally entitled to confidentiality in this matter.
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Email is a very important way students can communicate
with their TAs. Email can take quite a lot of time to answer,
especially if it is a large class. If a student sends email
often, one solution is to wait a day or two before
replying. This will encourage students to both think about the
problem more themselves and to come into your
office hours.
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Handling Recitation Sections
If you are teaching a recitation section,
visit the room before the first meeting. Know how long it takes to get to
your classroom, how to work the lights, shades, windows, etc. Check any
equipment you will be using. Get comfortable speaking in the room and make
sure your voice and your writing can be interpreted by the person sitting in
the most distant seat.
Write the course name and number on the board. This message will alert any
students who are in the wrong classroom to leave before you begin.
Introduce yourself. Tell your students your name, your interest in the
subject, and some facts about yourself to break the ice. Tell them where you
were born, where you went to college, why you became interested in the
subject, etc.
Address administrative concerns. Announce homework policies, office hours,
project requirements prerequisities, etc. Ask students if they have any
administrative concerns or any other concerns they might have.
Remain calm. Pauses while you wait seem very long to you, but really are not.
Try counting to 10 or 20. Pauses give students time to think too, and it is
okay to say you are unsure.
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Improving Teaching
Use mid-quarter student evaluations. The evaluation can simply be
a request for the students to take a few minutes to write suggestions
about things you can do to improve, or it can be a more formal questionnaire.
If you use a questionnaire, it should have two sections:
a general section so you can spot general reactions
to your teaching; another section so that you can focus on questions that are
of most interest or concern to you. Be sure to try to follow up on some of
the students' feedback. Announce in the next class which issues have appeared
and how you propose to resolve them. This will give the students a sense that
you take their opinions and feedback seriously.
Be videotaped by the Center for Teaching and Learning. This method allows you
to see your own teaching. You may arrange free videotaping through the Center
for Teaching and Learning by calling approximately a week in advance. You can
have a personal copy made for a nominal fee, and then you can ask others to
view and give comments on your teaching at their own convenience. It may also
be good to have a copy for yourself for future reference to see how your
teaching has improved and as evidence of effective teaching.
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Available Resources to Help You Improve Your Teaching
The Center for Teaching and Learning is in charge of keeping cutting edge
resources at the hands of instructors of all types at Stanford. They are
located in Sweet Hall and can be reached at extension 3-1326. The following
is a comprehensive, but not exhaustive, list of services available to you.
Teaching Orientations. A full day of presentations and
workshops are
sponsored each fall to prepare new instructors and teaching assistants for
their duties and to suggest new ideas and methods for the already experienced.
Mini-orientations are held at the beginning of winter and spring quarters.
Consultants. Consultants are available to advise you on your
teaching by
making classroom visits, reviewing videotapes, suggesting specific
improvements, or pointing to the right resources for particular problems that
arise. All consultations are confidential.
Videotaping. This can be arranged by making an appointment a week in
advance.
There is no service fee, but if you want a personal copy of your teaching, a
copy can be purchased at reproduction costs.
Teaching Assistant Questionnaire.
Consultants can give you a framework for
designing your own TA questionnaire and help you refine specific questions.
In-Course Assessment.
Materials and workshops on in-course assessment
are available. You can also request assistance in designing assessment techniques.
Personalized Practice Sessions.
If you are going to be giving a seminar or
presenting a paper at a professional conference, you may want to perfect your
presentation ahead of time. CTL can hold practice session with consultants,
with a video camera, with a small group of peers. This service is free.
Workshops.
Each year, CTL sponsors talks on various aspects of effective
university teaching. CTL also designs workshops, at departmental requests,
for specific groups of faculty or teaching assistants.
Teaching Portfolios.
CTL can assist in putting together a teaching
portfolio to use on the job market or for your own reflection and professional
development.
Resource Center.
A library of materials on teaching and teaching improvement
is available. CTL staff also serve as liaisons to other resources on campus.
Technology in Teaching.
CTL has instructional technology specialists to
consult on the use of technology in teaching. Call extension 3-8676.
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Tips for being an RA
Being an RA can encompass a wide range of research tasks, such as
problem solving, programming, and literature searches and support. Literature
support is discussed here.
Often a professor will present an RA with a list of references and ask
that the correpsonding papers be retrieved and photocopied for
them. Expect there to be the occasional typo in the referencing.
Literature Support
The first step you will have to take is to search for the papers to
find out which library at Stanford houses them. Stanford has 24
librares! More information about then can be obtained from http://www-sul.stanford.edu/geninfo/libraries.html.
Finding journal locations can often be done by searching for the journal name using Socrates,
Stanford's own library search tool. You can link through to Socarates
the http://www-sul.stanford.edu/.
Finding the journal or text will them allow you to discover which
Stanford library it is in. You can use the departmental photocopier to
copy the article for the professor. Stanford syubscribes to some of
the journals in an online format and you may be able to link to and
simply print the artcle. The URL wil be listed in the Socrates
reference. Another thing to be aware of is that Socrates will lists
its hits will the journals placed at the end. It can save some time to
skip to the end and look there first
Professors may sometimes ask you to do a literature search. They will likely
give you a specific topic and ask you to find out what has been
published on it. This can be done using Socrates but Socrates does not
search journal articles, and this will likely be the most important
part of your search. There are several places to search journal
articles, usually classified by subject. Here is a partial list of
some of the more important ones:
- For statistics articles try:
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For mathematics articles try MathSciNet:
http://ams.rice.edu/mathscinet/.
This allows a full-text search so again you can search for citations.
- For engineering articles try INSPEC:
http://inspec/lanl/gov/stanford/.
This allows a full-text search also.
- For medical or biostat articles try Medline:
http://www-sul.stanford.edu/catdb/help/medac.html/.
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In general: The Stanford library system lists a large number
of searchable databases at http://www-sul.stanford.edu/cadb/alldata.html (linkable from the main library page by clicking on Databases). Usually you can find what you are looking for here. Occasionally you may need to search from a Stanford IP address and the Stanford subscriptions only work for Stanford IP addesses.
This can easily be done in any of the departmental computers.
Don't forget that a simple websearch can often lead you right to the author's homepage where you might be able to download the article!
What if you can't find the article or the library doesn't
have it?.
This is a very common problem. If the article of
book is in the Stanford Library system but checked out you can
place a recall on the item on the web through Socrates. If you
search for the item using Socrates it will provide links for
you to submit a recall.
If the journal is not in the Stanford system you can also use
the web link through Socrates to request the item using
InterLibrary Loan. It will take a few days but they will find
the article and deliver it to you.
Sometimes journals change their names or are filed differently
over time. To hunt down one of these journals in the math
library you wil need to use a filing cabinet called The
Kardex. Its located right across from the checkout desk and
has a big sign on it so its easy to spot. Here you can look up
the journal title and find out its status in the library and
whether or not it has changed names. For help with this
consult any of the library's staff.
Its also useful to know that you can renew books and journals
three times online at http://www-sul.stanford.edu/ if you just click on My Circulation Records, under User Services. After three renewals you'll have to bring the items in to be renewed.
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