This session will teach participants some simple tips and tricks to help transition from being an undergraduate student to an effective, confident graduate TA. Don't worry, you will survive!
Learn some strategies for feeling confident and prepared for your first day of teaching. Establish classroom relationships through meaningful meet-and-greet activities. List of "dos" and "don'ts" for the first day. Learn to set a healthy tone that's conducive to learning.
What are first year learners all about and how do they go about learning course material? Our goal in this session is to explore established frameworks that can help to better understand the first year student as a learner. Come and find out how you can use this understanding in conjunction with your course role (as a Teaching Assistant) to make learning, teaching and assessment an enjoyable, effective and valuable experience.
Do you remember any of the TA's you had in undergrad? What did they do to make you remember them? This seminar will provide you with some hints and tools necessary to become an effective and memorable TA in a large lab situation.
This session is based on a simple foundation: if you teach well, you'll end up learning as much as your students. It focuses on a specific skill: writing. And it presents an approach that can best be described as counter-intuitive. In other words, for about 75 minutes, we'll explore how to improve your students' writing skills – and, consequently, your own – largely by setting aside writing advice or habits you've probably embraced during your academic career so far. And we'll practise applying this new perspective to situations that you'll encounter in your role as a TA: critiquing student writing; and consulting with students about their writing.
Globalization is affecting our education. In a multicultural environment as the University of Guelph and the Canadian Society is
key to understand how culture affects the way we learn. This seminar will highlight the importance of a having a global perspective in
learning and teaching with a dynamic and active discussion. By knowing our students as ourselves we can improve our skills to improve the way we educate a diverse society.
As a TA you are given a limited amount of time to grade each paper and/or exam. Plus, as a graduate student you have many other things to keep in balance. Time is always the limiting factor! In this interactive workshop you will learn and share some tools and techniques to speed up your marking while still giving effective feedback to students.
This workshop emphasizes the transformative potential of our responses to students' written work, and suggests that our responses and comments should be seen as communicative rather than punitive, so that students are led to look at how they create their texts and become active learners. There will also be a discussion of strategies to prevent plagiarism, what to do if you suspect a student has plagiarised, as well as tips to make marking papers more efficient.
How to make material in tutorials more exciting and engaging for students. We'll consider strategies to tackle "boring" topics (like grammar), how to set up tutorials to encourage participation, and creative ways to cover material.
TA and Instructor Communication, Responsibilities and Various Issues - Consistent Grading, Rubrics, Classroom and Online Behaviour, Time for Students, Office Hours, Midterm and Exam Formats, Exam Invigilation and More.
Not sure what to do on the first day of class? Worried that all you’ll get is blank stares from your students? Come to this session for tips and a discussion on what to do on the first day of classes that will (hopefully) lead to a successful semester with your students.
Description: What is your role in promoting academic integrity with your students? How can The Library support that role? Come test your knowledge about plagiarism in this interactive session and learn strategies you can integrate into your teaching to help your students avoid becoming a plagiarism suspect.
Students are increasingly living 'hybrid' digital/analogue lives. This session explores a series of tools that teaching assistants (TAs) can use to maximize students' learning experiences. I would like us to examine the possibilities that some web tools bring to the learning environment, as well as ways of overcoming challenges that can accompany them. The tools that I will be talking about include: email and shared online calendaring, teleconferencing, blogs, facebook (and other social networking sites) and wikis. I also want to briefly touch on privacy concerns that may emerge after deploying these tools - how can we deploy these tools responsibly, and how can we preemptively avoid privacy breaches?
In this session we'll discuss strategies and tips on how to deal with over- and under-talkers in seminars. We will also think about * why * some students might talk too much or too little in class.
Have you ever wondered why someone you know excels in one class but does poorly in another? Or how you can appreciate the teaching style of one prof, but your friend does not? One explanation might be a differences in learning styles. Our preferred ways of receiving and processing new information can be key in the ability to master new knowledge and skills. Come to this session to learn more about learning styles and how they can affect your learning experiences and your ability to help others learn.
This session will help participants learn why students write poorly and provide them with some helpful techniques for giving constructive criticism on sub-par writing.
For a variety of reasons, some courses can be challenging to effectively TA: some courses are set up in a way that does not facilitate good teaching, some courses are filled with apathetic students, and some courses are outside of your area of comfort or expertise. Knowing your specific situation and understanding how to approach it are crucial to successful teaching and a positive experience.