Having never viewed myself as an expert and periodically believed I’m an imposter just waiting to be found out, I went a long time without worrying about the so-called curse of knowledge. I couldn’t possibly know too much math and chemistry, the content I teach.
A few months after I received my university’s undergraduate teaching award in 2009, my classroom anxiety dreams went from merely hairy to absolutely hair-raising. For years, I’d dreamed about my classes erupting in chaos: rebellious students flipping over desks, watching pornography while I lectured, or—most
A year ago I received the worst student ratings of instruction (SRIs) in my 28 years of teaching. On the Likert scale I am normally between 4 and 5 for quality of instructor and quality of the course. Last year, however, my fall term ratings
Whether for a newly minted PhD or a subject-matter expert plucked from outside academia, starting a college teaching career can be daunting. A new faculty member needs a guide, a role model, and a trusted friend to jump-start their success in the classroom. A mentor
It is time to bid farewell to a career I have loved for so long that it now seems entirely too short. Reflecting on 42 years of teaching and some of my missteps, I share here a few of the major lessons I’ve learned.
Think of the last time you had a masterfully planned class session fall completely flat. If you have been teaching for more than a week, you’ve been there. How did you react? Did you blame the students, the time of day the class meets, or
When our teaching focuses entirely on learning outcomes, we can become narrowly focused on seeing our students as skillsets. This can lead us to break learning into smaller and smaller parts so that we can successfully measure student “success.” But if, as Palmer emphasizes, we
“All teachers can improve; most should.” Did someone tell me this or did I make it up? I’ll put it in quotes because I’m not sure, but it’s a one-liner I like. To improve means to get better. It’s about ongoing efforts to teach in
Has teaching improved? It’s a question I’ve been putting to myself here on the backside of a long career. Without beginning benchmarks it’s hard to say for sure, maybe a bit, but not as much as it could or should. My feelings were reinforced by
Just in time to thwart any attempts at starting to unwind and enjoy a well-deserved break from another brutal academic year, automated results of the Student Course Satisfaction Surveys (aka evaluations) arrive in my inbox demanding attention.
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