Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!cmcl2!rutgers!bellcore!geppetto!duncan From: duncan@geppetto.ctt.bellcore.com (Scott Duncan) Newsgroups: comp.edu Subject: Re: Student and Course Integrity Message-ID: <12826@bellcore.bellcore.com> Date: 21 Dec 88 21:58:00 GMT References: <4550@homxc.UUCP> <4847@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> <2082@imagine.PAWL.RPI.EDU> <9237@ihlpb.ATT.COM> <8716@burdvax.PRC.Unisys.COM> Sender: news@bellcore.bellcore.com Reply-To: duncan@ctt.bellcore.com (Scott Duncan) Organization: Computer Technology Transfer, Bellcore Lines: 89 In article <8716@burdvax.PRC.Unisys.COM> dave@emerald.PRC.Unisys.COM (David Lee Matuszek) writes: > >1. True, the teaching assistants have not, in general, had any >education courses. Neither have the professors! But they have a number of years of experience, at least. That's something a new teaching assistant doesn't. And it's something the assistant could benefit from if that experience were passed along more overtly. >2. We worked very hard at choosing the teaching assistants; we always >had good reasons to believe that the persons we chose both knew the >material and had good communication skills. Other factors are >involved in choosing faculty. I was given NO indication of why I was choosen to teach other than that I think I recall asking to do so (as opposed to starting out purely as a research assistant which I did my second year). No one EVER conveyed to me what they thought I had done right/wrong in the classroom -- I was only observed once. >3. If a teaching assistant turned out to be a poor teacher, we got >them out of teaching (made them a graduate assistant, or something). >While faculty can be released because of poor teaching, it's damned >rare, and I have never seen a case (and I've known some pretty poor >teachers!). I'm sure this is true. As I've posted in another article, the encouragement is NOT to improve as a teacher, but to excel as a scholar/researcher. >4. In my experience (~21 years on one side or the other), on average, >teaching assistants teach about as well as faculty. The bad ones are >seldom as bad, the good ones are seldom as good, and the average is >probably a little higher. Distressing news no matter how you look at it. >5. I think few would disagree that teaching works better when the >teacher is interested in and excited by his/her subject matter. When, >in the name of teaching students with "real professors," you take >experts and have them teach introductory material to Freshman, this >is bad news for everyone concerned (again, in my experience). Often >enough, however, teaching assistants ARE excited about the material, >and convey that excitement to their students. Well, I've know experts who were also enthusiastic. I suggest we hunt them down and let them teach freshman. (And be sure they are not stigmatized for being willing to do so rather than teach another graduate section on their latest research paper.) >6. At most schools each faculty member is qualified to teach a narrow >range of advanced courses, and nobody else on the faculty (or almost >nobody else) is qualified to teach those courses. Hence, putting >faculty to work teaching lowest-common-denominator courses is poor >utilization of resources. This is simple economics, a matter of >getting the most value for your resources. Then I believe it is necessary to improve the quality of those who teach the majority of students -- the assistants who teach the intro classes which make up people NOT intending to go on in the discipline, but needing a good ground- ing in it. >7. Public school teachers have taken LOTS of education courses. Yet >somehow, when people talk about the crisis in education, they usually >mean in the public schools, not in the universities--why is that? Well, in another posting (same one referred to above), I noted my negative experience with "education courses." (I did well in them but was bored to tears and had my spirit for public education dampened totally by the exper- ience.) >Yes, I agree with you that everyone who teaches should have some >training in how to teach. Yes, I agree with you that a student needs >to build a firm foundation in the basics of a subject before going on >to advanced topics. Yes, you have probably encountered a teaching >assistant--maybe more than one--with abysmal teaching skills. But if >you conclude from this that we should replace teaching assistants with >faculty, you're dead wrong. Don't tar everyone with the same brush. Not replace them completely. What you say about resources is valid. But I very much feel something more deliberate needs to be done to impart some basic classroom and planning skills to teaching assistants. >-- Dave Matuszek (dave@prc.unisys.com) >-- Unisys Corp. / Paoli Research Center / PO Box 517 / Paoli PA 19301 Speaking only for myself, of course, I am... Scott P. Duncan (duncan@ctt.bellcore.com OR ...!bellcore!ctt!duncan) (Bellcore, 444 Hoes Lane RRC 1H-210, Piscataway, NJ 08854) (201-699-3910 (w) 201-463-3683 (h))