Working as a teaching assistant is one of the most challenging and demanding aspects of graduate school, yet many graduate programs pay little attention to it. TAs receive little or no training in the art of teaching and, in many cases, operate without an institutionalized statement of expectations. Based on our own experience as political science TAs and TA trainers, we offer the following advice.
The TA role is an unusual one. The TA is not yet an instructor with a class of her own, but she is a teacher charged with grading, managing class sections or recitations, and even lecturing under the larger umbrella of a professor’s course. Sometimes it is easy for graduate students to forget that our TA responsibilities make us professionals within our universities. We devote a large proportion of our time to our work as students, yet we are also paid to teach. In fact, our most important role may be that of a broker between undergraduates and professors. Many students are more comfortable approaching TAs than professors with questions and concerns. Most professors at research universities lack sufficient time to meet with each of their students individually.
We can best negotiate this fuzzy space between student and professor by thinking of our TA position as an early stage in our professional careers. Identifying ourselves as professionals is also essential for gaining the respect of our students, our professors, and for maintaining our own self respect. We have enjoyed and endured 16 semesters of combined experience as TAs, and we have learned that TA success hinges on a thorough understanding of the expectations that affect our roles as classroom leaders, discussion facilitators, and graders. The list that follows presents our observations and suggestions relevant to each role that the TA must play.
Classroom Leader
Most TAs are responsible for attending lecture sections for the class to which they are assigned. Some are even asked to contribute to the lecture from time to time. It is important to negotiate your responsibilities with the course professor before the semester begins.
- Before the semester begins, make sure you meet with the professor you’ll be working for. Ask her to convey her expectations regarding class attendance, readings, help with photocopies and class handouts, discussion sections, and grading policies. Make sure you understand the course’s purpose and your responsibilities. For example, one of our supervising professors preferred to utilize “class participation points” to assess the overall progress of a student throughout the semester rather than strictly assessing student participation in each class. Clarifying this grading preference before the semester started helped us meet the professor’s grading expectation and communicate this expectation to the students as well.
- It is your responsibility to be conspicuously present in class so that students can identify you as the TA. This means that you should dress professionally, arrive several minutes before class starts and stay several minutes after class ends. Dressing professionally does not necessarily entail wearing a suit, but it does entail dressing more formally than your students -- if only slightly. You should ensure that you can be readily distinguished from your students by your manner of dress. This will make you identifiable and help you maintain the respect of your students. Your presence before and after class gives students time to approach you with questions and concerns. This has the added benefit of dramatically reduce your e-mail load.
- Most of the questions you will field as a TA require you to clarify content in the readings and lectures. To prepare for this you should read what the students are assigned at least a week ahead of time and take careful notes in class. This is particularly important when you are assisting a class outside your area of expertise.
- You must always remember that this is the professor’s course, not your own. If you object to aspects of the course syllabus or content, address them first with the professor before taking a position on them with the students. Although you should feel free to offer input, the professor has the last word on the course design, method of evaluation, and content.
- You are a teaching assistant, not a personal assistant. You should not be washing cars, picking up dry cleaning, or doing other work that is not related to the course. At most universities the TA workload is between 15 to 20 hours per week. Devoting more time than this could significantly impede your graduate career. If you feel the professor’s expectations are unreasonable you should discuss this with her as soon as possible. If this is not effective you should then speak with your advisor, director of graduate studies, chair of your department, a university ombudsman or union representative. If you raise the issue with one of these authorities, your complaint will be most effective if you have documented the specific instances of work requests you deem unreasonable.
Discussion Leader
The TAs primary responsibility is often to teach smaller “sections” or “recitation sessions” of a large lecture class. Thus, the TA is serving to complement lectures with guided discussion and debate. Since the university is committed to fostering “critical thinking skills,” “problem solving,” and “sound argumentation” among students, these sections are vital.
- Use the first meeting of the section to create an atmosphere conducive to discussion. Arrive early and set the chairs in a circle or square. Tell the students about yourself and your qualifications for teaching. Ask the students to share some information about themselves as well, such as their majors, extracurricular activities and goals for the course. It is very worthwhile to spend some time learning the students’ names during and after the first meeting because it generates trust and familiarity -- essential components of lively discussion. Index cards and photos from the registrar, when available, are particularly useful memorization tools.
- Many people find the discussion of political topics uncomfortable or even intimidating, while others love to express their opinions and argue. During the first meeting the TA should lay out some ground rules for participation and establish herself as a moderator who controls discussion. One way to ensure that everyone has a comfortable opportunity to contribute is to give students the questions you plan on asking them before class. The TA must establish clear guidelines to ensure that outspoken students do not trample less expressive students, and that disagreements do not explode into personal battles. One creative academic exercise that we have used, actually asks the individuals engaged in an escalating disagreement to trade perspectives and argue for the other side’s case. This helps to defuse the tension, eliminate personal arguments, and develop critical thinking on the issue.
- One key to being a good teacher is to understand what your students are experiencing. Only by administering course evaluations will you be able to understand how the students are experiencing the course and help you improve. However, course evaluations are usually completed at the end of the course, cheating the students out of the benefits that stem from their own input. TAs can issue their own evaluations half-way through the course or ask for feedback on specific topics. Sometimes these mid-term evaluations can actually lead to significant changes in the remaining discussion sections. For example, in an American politics class student feedback recommended that we spend more time clarifying concepts, legal cases, and governmental processes before engaging in class debate exercises because a significant number of students felt under prepared for the debates. We shifted the trajectory of the section to address that particular class’s need for more background clarification.
- Universities now offer a variety of educational resources to students with various needs. Some of these include writing labs, tutoring centers, English as a second language programs, and disabilities services. It is part of the TA’s role as an educator to communicate the availability of these resources to the students.
- If you are a natural born lecturer, be careful not to dominate a discussion section by reviewing course material. If you are a natural born facilitator, make sure you give enough time to clarifying course material.
- As graduate students we are surrounded by colleagues who find our subject matter inherently fascinating, but for many students it is not. It is the TA’s responsibility to make our universe relevant to all students, whether they are majors in it or not. Relating the lectures to current events and students’ daily lives whenever possible will motivate students and give a greater appreciation for the subject matter.
Grader
However you identify yourself, your students will most definitely identify you as their grader. For better and worse students are almost always focused on the final grade they will receive in the class. Here are several tips to ensure that your grading process is fair, useful as an educational device, and that it does not place a distracting amount of stress on the students.
- The TA is responsible for preparing students for exams. The most fundamental preparatory task is to ensure that the students understand your grading expectations for exams and papers. Students benefit when you go over a sample exam response or sample paper and show them how you evaluate it. You might also ask them to create exam questions, so that they understand how exams are created. The more the students understand the grading process, the more relaxed and better prepared they will be for exams and papers.
- Most students and many teachers view an exam exclusively as an assessment tool, yet it can also be a teaching tool. It is, after all, a form of communication between teacher and student. It is not enough to simply pass out exams and assign grades to student work -- comment thoughtfully on student work.
- Papers and exams are good sources of information on how your students are doing, but indirectly they are also a great way to see how you are doing. Student exam performance and writing should also communicate something to the teacher. The TA should reflect on the student work and use it to improve the way they run discussion sections and prepare students for exams and papers.
- It is best to grade exams and papers blind. No matter how unbiased we think we are, it is impossible to separate a student’s identity from grading decisions. If you are administering exams in blue books, ask that the books be handed in and stacked with the first page open. If you are collecting printed papers, ask for a separate title page that can be folded back. These methods will enable you to grade without seeing the students’ names. Make sure that you are grading with clear standards in mind and that these standards are in line with those of the other TAs and the course professor.
Most of us came to the university for the pursuit of knowledge. If we fail to pay careful attention to the craft of teaching, even as TAs, we deprive our students of this pursuit and damage our own development as professionals. Graduate students should whole heartedly embrace the TA experience as an opportunity to develop an expertise in teaching. The lessons and methods you’ll learn during these years will follow wherever the job market may lead you.
