EEMB 502 Teaching Techniques (Winter 2001)

As my first formal teaching class I ever took part in, my department's Teaching Techniques course was an eye-opening experience. I had been a teaching assistant the previous quarter and received high reviews from my students. I thought, "I must be good at this." While that may or may not have been the case, this course showed me just how much I could improve the methods I used to present material to my students. The discussions and presentations of teaching techniques and situations were helpful, but the most enlightening experience was my presentation of a short lesson to the class and the subsequent evaluation from my peers. I realized that I knew the information well and was able to clearly explain it, but the organization of even this short lesson left something to be desired. This experience and the input of my peers gave me a structure that I have been able to adapt to many of my later teaching experiences. By following the structure, the students know the direction of the lecture or lesson from the beginning and once I have presented the information, it gives me a method to draw back to the main points in summary. This repetition and review allows students to hear the main concepts and supporting material more than one and hopefully conceptualize the information better. The second important skill I gained was to be able to view others teaching not only as a student, but also as a fellow teacher to learn new teaching skills. This has been very important in the development of my teaching skill, because it has allowed me to recognize the skills and traits in others that I would like to incorporate into my on teaching techniques and methods. While this course is one that many graduate students dread (and I was no different), I found it very useful and opened my mind to the detail that must go into successful teaching.