Farewell university TAing

Oh yeah, an update on where I'm at now.

I moved across the world from Sydney to San Francisco and now I'm working here as a software engineer. But I still haven't given up on being the best teacher in the world, and I want to see what I can achieve with my spare time.

I think I'll pick up a few teaching projects.
- private tutoring
- solo compass v2 in collaboration with high schools
- youtube channel
- educational webapp ideas (I know, it's clichéd. But my webapp will be magical.
- educational mini-lectures at my new company

I still haven't given up. I owe myself that much.




Below is the graveyard of my university TA hopes and dreams. I kind of feel like a failure when I look at the goals I set at the start of last year.

No time for regrets, though. Only time for review and improvement.

Goals

1. Being didactically effective. Communicating information efficiently given limited time. Ensuring students are prepared for examination.
2. Inspiring students to learn. Motivating them to learn, and making the learning experience enjoyable. Presenting content in an interesting fashion.
3. Empower students to do what they want to do.
4. Improve students' abilities to learn. Aid their meta-learning: improve their perception of their own learning.
5. Build teamwork, team spirit, and empathy. Teach students to value and trust each other, and to work together effectively.


The primary goals are the ones at the top. When I am limited for time, I will only be able to cater for the goals at the top, and they should serve as a baseline for my teaching. We have to make sure that this is solid foundation before considering any other goals.


When I find myself in excess of time, the goals at the bottom start to become viable, and I will be able to integrate them into my teaching while maintaining the stable foundation mentioned above.


Realistically, I think that only 1. will be wholly achievable this semester, and I will be forced to sacrifice others to implement it effectively. The other goals are extremely ambitious, and difficult to implement effectively.

Names

Post tags:

• protactinium/icecold/compass - names of various subjects I teach
• personal - reflections on myself unrelated to any course
• pedagogy - discussions of educational theory

Code names:

• 'climbtrees' - Me.
• 'compass' - A high school extracurricular club teaching computing. I am the administrator for this course.
• 'icecold' - A university course teaching computing. I am a TA for this course.
• 'protactinium' - A university course teaching computing. I am a TA for this course.