A recent study of graduate assistants

University administrators, college deans, department chairpersons and directors, faculty members, graduate assistants, and undergraduate students were mailed questionnaires concerning the roles of and attitudes toward graduate assistants at the University of Minnesota. Basic agreement was found to exist among the six groups surveyed with regard to many aspects of graduate assistantships. Graduate assistants were found to have little knowledge of many departmental concerns that directly affect them. The number of formalized policies regulating graduate assistantships was found to vary with the classification of assistantship.Copies of the complete report may be obtained from Measurement Services Center, University of Minnesota, 9 Clarence Ave. S.E., Minneapolis, Minnesota 55414.     

研究生助教：如何能有效“教”与“学”

研究生助教的助教工作具有一定的特殊性,其一方面是教,是＂助教＂,另一方面是＂学＂,主要是在实践中学习＂如何教＂。当前,研究生助教在＂教＂与＂学＂方面的问题主要表现为：教学质量有待提高、教师专业发展途径单一、师徒制学习方式实施效度较低等,这与我国研究生助教制度在实施中过于强调功利化目的而弱化其教学发展性功能、助教制度规则不完善、缺乏对研究生助教的相关培训或培训形式化及师徒制学习方式效度发挥的条件性有关。要有效提升研究生助教的＂教＂与＂学＂,建议强化教学发展性目的,创新研究生助教制度建设,加强对研究生助教的教师教育,强化其课后反思,有选择、分步骤地尝试让师徒相互合作,同台教学,为研究生助教提供合法边缘参与机会。     

高职会计实践教学中运用体验式教学模式的研究

体验式教学模式依据企业实际业务和教学目标创设情境,将学生置身于教学情境中进行体验与实践,通过实践与反思的结合来加深知识的理解和技能的掌握,使学生真正成为教学过程中的主体,帮助学生更好地掌握专业知识,既提高了学生的职业技能,也提升了教学效果。     

Graduate teaching assistants: motives,difficulties and professional interactions and their relationship to perceived benefits

ABSTRACT

Graduate students play a major role in teaching in higher education, particularly in undergraduate programs. The purpose of the present study was two-fold: first, to identify graduate students’ motives for working as graduate teaching assistants (GTAs), describe some aspects of their work, and ascertain their perceived benefits; second, to predict GTAs’ benefits as a function of their individual background characteristics, motives, job difficulties, and richness of professional interactions with the course instructor. Data were collected from 189 GTAs who led discussion groups at a large research university in Israel by means of an internet questionnaire. Findings revealed that graduate students accepted the position of GTA mainly for extrinsic reasons, such as salary and convenience. They claimed to have faced few difficulties and that their professional interactions with the course instructors focused more on job responsibilities and less on pedagogical issues. They reported having gained a greater understanding of course content and improved teaching skills due to their experience as GTAs. Richness of contact with the course instructor, motives, difficulties, and faculty match significantly contributed to predicting perceived benefits. The implications of the results are discussed.     

Just add hours? An assessment of pre-service teachers’ perception of the value of professional experience in attaining teacher competencies

This study compared pre-service teachers’ perceptions of their professional competencies at two campuses of a large regional teacher education university, where one campus provided students 22% more hours of professional placement in schools and related educational settings. Students who had experienced more hours in schools and such settings were more positive about their, ability to apply their knowledge of students and how they learn, classroom management, professional knowledge and practice, and community engagement; however, when students felt well supported during professional experience, such differences diminished. Additional hours were not associated with pre-service teachers’ perceptions of their ability to apply subject content and teaching; plan, assess and report; and effective student communication. Researchers argued that this pointed to the crucial role of good classroom mentors in teacher professional experience but also the value of students’ tertiary teacher education in preparing them for classroom teaching.     

Developing a Training Course for Undergraduate Teaching Assistants

An undergraduate teaching assistant (UTA) training course was developed using existing best practices and Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives as a framework. Course goals included developing assistants’ content knowledge, procedural knowledge, and metacognition regarding teaching. Across three semesters, UTAs’ (N?=?68) pre- and post-test responses showed significant increases in their teaching-related knowledge, confidence in their skills, consideration of a teaching-related career, and perceived benefits of being a UTA. The course provides an efficient method by which assistants learn to support students and faculty in a range of undergraduate courses, serving as a potential model for other teaching assistantship programs.     

Socialization of Doctoral Students: Implications for Social Work Education

Recent discussions on social work education increasingly have drawn attention to doctoral education. The purpose of this article is to consider these discussions that debated some of the ways of improving doctoral student education and professional development, using professional socialization as a conceptual framework. Issues such as research, teaching, and research assistantship, and conferences are considered as key components of the process of preparing doctoral students for knowledge building through teaching and research. Finally, the paper discusses some implications for social work education.     

Enhancing student learning of research methods through the use of undergraduate teaching assistants

By using a quasi-experimental design, in this study, we test the effect of undergraduate teaching assistants on student learning. Data were collected from 170 students enrolled in four sections of a quantitative research methods course, two sections without undergraduate teaching assistants and two sections with undergraduate teaching assistants, over two semesters. Results indicate that having undergraduate teaching assistants in the classroom can result in higher student performance. Students in the sections with undergraduate teaching assistants earned higher grades, were more likely to pass the course with a C or higher and performed better on half of the student learning outcomes than students in the sections without an undergraduate teaching assistant. Based on the overwhelmingly positive results on student learning, we would recommend the active use of undergraduate teaching assistants in the classroom, but especially for courses that students find challenging.     

浅析学前教育专业钢琴教学

钢琴是高职学前教育专业音乐课目中的一门重要的技能课程。不仅要培养学生扎实的钢琴弹奏基本功,更应注重学生综合能力和实际应用能力的培养。试就学前教育专业钢琴课存在的问题进行深入剖析,并针对幼师钢琴教学的特点,提出相应的解决措施,以期对实际教学能够有所裨益。     

Do resource bases enable social inclusion of students with Asperger syndrome in a mainstream secondary school?

This research identifies the way in which one secondary school with a resourced provision for students with Asperger syndrome promotes social inclusion for them, and the perceptions of staff members and parents on the social experience of schooling for these children. Interviews were conducted with five teachers, two learning support assistants, and the head of the resourced provision. Questionnaires were completed by eight parents of students with Asperger syndrome who attend the provision. The research found that a positive social experience of schooling was perceived by members of staff and parents due to the additional support of the resource in teaching social skills, providing a safe place and support from the learning support assistants. Some negative perceptions of social experience were also reported, which highlighted the need for educational provision for students on the autism spectrum to be considered at an individual level.     

高职“国际贸易实务”课程项目化教学改革

项目化教学改革有利于让学生在学中做、做中学,培养学生的专业综合能力。高职“国际贸易实务”课程实施项目化教学改革,进行项目化总体设计,引入企业真实项目,让企业积极参与教学和评价,学生不仅能很好地串联所学知识点和技能点,且可大大提升学生的专业综合能力。     

Assessing the impact of a university teaching development programme

Four different indicators are used to assess the impact of a year‐long university teaching development programme in an Australian research‐led university. All four indicators show small positive outcomes. Teachers who complete the programme have higher rates of receipt of teaching awards and teaching development grants than their colleagues who do not participate in the programme. Students in the classes of teachers who complete the programme report, on average, higher satisfaction scores than students in the classes of the same teacher before she/he completed the programme. Students in the faculties where the programme is completed by a higher proportion of academic staff report greater change to levels of satisfaction in the quality of their degree over the seven‐year period of the study. The methodology adopted involves several new approaches to evaluation and confirms the need for the use of an evaluation framework and multi‐indicator strategy.     

Student perspectives on curricular change: lessons from an undergraduate lower-division biology core

Inquiry-based laboratories are acknowledged as the preferred method of instruction for development of research skills. Much has been written about changes in student performance associated with inquiry, but less is known about how students view the inquiry-based format or whether they perceive a benefit from this type of instruction. The Student Assessment of Learning Gains (SALG) survey was used to evaluate and compare student reactions to the new, inquiry-based laboratories of a lower-division undergraduate curriculum, from implementation to the present (an interval of 3 yr). Initial student response to the format and value of the inquiry labs improved over time. The quality of the graduate teaching assistants and the clarity of the laboratory manual were important variables influencing student perception. A student's perception of his/her retention of lab-related skills was strongly associated with perceptions of gains in those skills. Student responses reflect their most current laboratory experience and not a cumulative effect of participation in the core series of courses. Student success in the inquiry format was not associated with gender or status as a transfer student. The majority of students believe that their experiences in the lower-division inquiry labs have prepared them for upper-division course work.     

Factors influencing students' decisions to participate in a short “dissection experience” within a systemic anatomy course

Changes in medical education have affected both curriculum design and delivery. Many medical schools now use integrated curricula and a systemic approach, with reduced hours of anatomy teaching. While learning anatomy via dissection is invaluable in educational, professional, and personal development, it is time intensive and supports a regional approach to learning anatomy; the use of prosections has replaced dissection as the main teaching method in many medical schools. In our graduate‐entry medical degree, we use an integrated curriculum, with prosections to teach anatomy systemically. However, to not exclude dissection completely, and to expose students to its additional and unique benefits, we implemented a short “Dissection Experience” at the beginning of Year 2. Students attended three two‐hour anatomy sessions and participated in dissection of the clinically relevant areas of the cubital fossa, femoral triangle, and infraclavicular region. This activity was voluntary and we retrospectively surveyed all students to ascertain factors influencing their decision of whether to participate in this activity, and to obtain feedback from those students who did participate. The main reasons students did not participate were previous dissection experience and time constraints. The reasons most strongly affecting students' decisions to participate related to experience (lack of previous or new) and new skill. Students' responses as to the most beneficial component of the dissection experience were based around practical skills, anatomical education, the learning process, and the body donors. We report here on the benefits and practicalities of including a short dissection experience in a systemic, prosection‐based anatomy course. Anat Sci Educ 6: 225–231. © 2013 American Association of Anatomists.     

Instructional improvement and student engagement in post-secondary engineering courses: the complexity underlying small effect sizes

The current study leveraged a professional development programme for engineering faculty at a large research university to examine the impact of instructional improvement on student engagement. Professors who participated in the professional development were observed three times and rated using an existing observation protocol. Students in courses with instructors who participated and did not participate in the professional development were surveyed about their classroom engagement. The responses were used to conduct quasi-experimental comparisons. Results indicated that students in courses with professors who participated in the professional development self-reported 3% more behavioural and 2% more cognitive engagement than students with professors who did not participate. Within professional development group, follow-up comparisons showed that students in courses with the highest rated instructors self-reported 7% more cognitive engagement than students with lower ranked professors. Thematic coding of the qualitative data suggests that the highest rated instructors may have achieved these gains through the use of three domain general instructional strategies: activating prior knowledge, facilitating classroom interaction and promoting reflection. Findings are contextualised within extant literature reporting similar effect sizes, and implications for future engagement research from a classroom systems perspective are discussed.     

Teaching assistants from the People's Republic of China and US undergraduates: Perceptions of teaching and teachers

Abstract

The paper summarizes the results of a series of focus group interviews with Chinese teaching assistants and US undergraduates on their perceptions about teaching and teachers in their own and US cultures. Focus group interviews were held with Chinese math‐based science teaching assistants (CTAs) who were at three different stages of the teacher preparation process. Similarly, American undergraduates’ perceptions were elicited through focus group interviews and questionnnaires. CTAs viewed American college instructors as exciting, but unclear in their organization and presentation. Undergraduates thought ideal US professors should spend more time with their students, and have interpersonal skills in teaching. They did not value the professor's knowledge of the subject matter as much as CTAs did. Implications for future TA development programmes are also discussed.     

陕西省农村中学物理实验教学现状与对策研究

通过问卷及访谈,笔者对陕西省农村中学物理实验教学情况进行了调查研究,结果表明农村中学物理实验教学存在着教学仪器质量不佳和不足,实验数量偏少或不做,教师对实验教学缺乏信心等问题.这些问题需要人力、财力的投入,需要通过加强培训提高认识、专业引领来解决.     

TALIS2018折射出的教师教学实践:全球趋势与上海特点

通过分析TALIS2018关于教师教学实践的数据,从教学时间、教学方式、评价反馈三大方面可勾勒出全球和上海教师教学实践的四大特点:用于实际教学时间多,但新教师与经验教师有差距;近2/3的课堂上教师经常采用讲授策略;不到1/2的教师经常采用促进学生"自主学习"的策略;近八成的教师会为学生提供建设性反馈,而形成性评价运用频率不高。在分析上海教师的课堂教学实践与其他国家的异同后,讨论了五个问题:课堂管理的本质是管理,还是教师的沟通、组织与激发学生的能力?激发学生认知,对教师专业能力的挑战是技能,还是学科教学知识抑或学科教学经验?怎样使用信息通信技术真正让课堂中的教与学发生改变?教师的反馈与让学生评估自己的进步一样吗?提高教师命题研究能力的意义何在?作为教育专家的教师如何在工作中运用专业知识和技能以及如何进一步发展和改进。