Strategies for the Teaching Assistant

School starts soon if it hasn't already and for many people that means facing up to the responsibilities of being a teaching assistant for the first time. The responsibilities that a TA has are varied but there are several things to keep in mind when entering into this new job and responsibility for the first time.

I am by no means an expert, but I have been a teaching assistant for several semesters as an undergraduate. I was a TA for a first-year requirement course called Philosophy of Science and for an introductory philosophy course in analytic philosophy. I've also been a tutor in logic for a couple of semesters.

1. Be mindful of your class. This means that you should familiarize yourself with their names and/or what they look like. Most departments should have photos available for you to study before you go to your first class. This is as much for your comfort as it is for theirs. Obviously, if the class size is enormous, then it's not something you ought to concern yourself with since, depending on the size and nature of the class, you might be lucky to know a handful of students' names by Nov. Additionally, it might be helpful to discuss with the professor the various backgrounds and/or educational histories these students are coming from. Acnknowledging their academic experiences might make you a little wiser later on when it comes to understanding how or why a particular student asks this or that question, or is shy, or consistently makes the same error.

2. Make sure you understand all your essential responsibilities and/or obligations. As important as your relationship with the students is, your relationship with the faculty member who is the instructor for that course is equally if not more important. Confirm and reconfirm any obligations you've discussed. I remember that it took a few tries to really get in sync with the instructor's method of grading. Often times in the beginning you might grade from a place of wanting to satisfy the professor, but that can be as bad as being too individualistic about grading policies. However unregulated the content, make sure you know the material and know how the professor knows the material so that when you grade students' homework you don't have the feeling that the instructor will change all of your critiques in several hours. This latter point might be more relevant to the humanities, but for any sort of written response that you are grading there will always be variability in what's acceptable.

3. Don't be too hard on the students or yourself. You aren't the instructor, nor are you qualified to be. In many ways you should take that as a relief, even amidst the sometimes vague and dissolving lines between "instructor" and "teaching assistant".

Hopefully, you've got a young, sharp, and inquisitive mind and have some quality experience with the primary texts of the class. If an instructor welcomes critique, as philosophers always do (just kidding), then make sure you are appropriate about disagreeing with him or her. Word of advice: don't be too hard on the instructor, especially when it comes to policies he or she has been using effectively for several semesters. Give yourself and your students a break if the decision is yours and you feel its justified.

4. If it's at all possible for you to get lecture and/or class-discussion leading experience in, DO NOT HESITATE in taking advantage of it! If your instructor approaches you with an opportunity to teach a particular lesson, or if he approaches you with an opportunity to create a day's class discussion questions, then you shoudl do everything you can do take advantage of it and more, if possible. If possible, try to have your first teaching experience be in front of a smaller class (ideally less than 20). It also helps if that particular plan calls for a significant amount of participation from students. If you don't know what to say, the best bet is to ask questions and motivate discussion. For any class that you lecture and/or are the motivator of class discussions, it is ideal for you to also be the creator of the class discussion and/or homework questions for that day. It is not necessary, but if you're the author of the questions then you come into the class having a sense of what the questions were trying to motivate in a larger scheme. You'll be more able to respond to questions, and your command of both the grammar and the intent of the questions will make explanation that much easier.

Oh, and if you do lead the discussion, do not expect that all students will know exactly what you mean. If anything, chances are you'll be talking "above" them, as you would a professor or peer in your field. Remember that in all likelihood, these folks have had little in the way of specialized academic training. Even something as "general" as a class on college writing will be particularly daunting for some of the students.

5. Always make yourself available. It goes without saying that the more times we hear something, the more likely we are to have it "sink in." Students might hear that you're "available every Tuesday for help with their papers" but accepting it with the intent to act on it...that's a different story. A simple reaffirmation of your availability will help, especially when and if it is the case that your students don't know you.

6. Finally, don't be afraid to joke. You can even joke about the instructor in as innocent a way as you can if he's not around--so long as you don't utter inappropriate remarks. If you stutter when presenting because of anxiety, make a joke about it and/or continue to stutter in a comical way. Don't take yourself too seriously: if you fall down when writing something on the chalk board, good for you. Falling down is a great ice-breaker.