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How do you know you are doing a good job? Reflection, feedback and evalution

As the first session of the series, after a quick introduction to the GTA development provision, we will present some tools and techniques to equip you to evaluate your teaching practice.
We will give you practical tips and look at techniques to use in your session to reflect on your teaching and gather feedback from students.
This will provide you a foundation to become a more reflective teacher and help you identify ways to develop (including the path to HEA accreditation).

Good teaching or good learning?

This session will provide an in-depth introduction to how students learn, approaches to learning and methods of teaching. The focus will be on small group teaching and how you can become more effective using some of the theoretical knowledge on students' learning in your practice.

Assessment & feedback: why is it important?

Assessment and feedback are a central activity for both students and teachers. Assessment is the way in which teachers can gauge whether students are learning and feedback is essential to students to improve. Students want prompt and extensive feedback, however, especially in large classes, this is not always feasible. This session will provide an overview of the complex interaction between assessment and feedback from a student and a teacher perspective.

Solving problems and tricky issues in your teaching (classroom mangement techniques)

 An essential characteristic of a good teacher is the ability to adapt to the class, the individual students, the teaching environment and the unexpected. Everyone, no matter how well prepared on the subject matter, sooner or later will face difficult situations: the aim of this interactive session is to bring in your experiences of teaching and reflect on what could have been done differently. Using practical cases the session will provide useful tips and practical techniques to handle the unexpected.

Providing effective feedback to students

 Students want it quickly, with a lot of details and personal. Some teachers say that students do not even read feedback and only complain when they do not get the mark they wanted.
This session aims to present some research evidence of what makes good feedback, how students use it. Using practical examples we will explore what you could do and how you could deliver effective feedback to students.

WORKSHOP: applying to the HEA

 You can obtain formal, professional recognition for the teaching you do by applying to become an Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (AFHEA).  The application process requires you to reflect on and provide evidence of your teaching practice; some of this can be provided by undertaking the work suggested in the various sessions of the GTA development provision. Alongside these sessions it is highly recommended that you use the templates provided and record your progress in an e-portfolio (i.e. Mahara). With this material at hand, this workshop will provide you a better insight in what is required to apply for recognition as an AFHEA. Dr. Jane MacKenzie, HEA accreditor will explain the application process and provide you with guidance on how to make a successful application.

Effective tutorial activities

 Tutorials are seen by students as the place 'where they can get the answers' or the time in which they 'have an opportunity to clarify difficult concepts'. To a certain extent, the goal for an effective tutorial is to help students learn to help themselves. To do this it is important to ensure that students actively engage with the material and the learning process and you can help them to achieve this with appropriate activities. This session will explore how certain activities can be used to improve students' engagement and make them more effective.

Problem/Task-focussed teaching 

 In some disciplines the use of problems, tasks or exemplars is the main focus of teaching in small groups. This can help focus students on the task as the primary objective of the session is to solve the problem or find a range of solutions. Whilst removing some of the creativity associated with designing activities, this provides a unique opportunity to make the theory relevant to solving practical issues in the real world. Evidence from problem-based teaching in medical sciences, however, shows that some students are more successful than other with this particular method of teaching. This session will provide a useful background for you to ensure that all students get the most out of these particular sessions.

Essay marking

As well as teaching students, essay marking is an essential task at University. Many courses rely on essay as the elected form of assessment and sometimes the only way to obtain feedback before the exams. Course leaders often rely on GTAs marking to help them to cope with the sheer number of students in their courses. A great responsibility is delegated to you as your assessment will affect directly students' GPA. Students care very much about the grade they receive, however they are often unaware of the process involved behind the scenes, which may rely on double marking or moderation to ensure fairness and accountability.
Keeping in mind the criteria and the marking guidelines offered both centrally and locally, this session will give you a practical overview of what you should be doing and what you should know when marking essays. 

Equality & Diversity in class

 With the contribution of the Equality and diversity Office and the Disablity Support Service, this session will provide a specific insight into how to tackle potentially tricky issues about equality and disability in the class. This does not only mean becoming more aware of the issues, but the speakers will provide a set of common practical cases/examples that you may encounter in your teaching and therefore will equip you to better understand the range of solutions available to you (your responsibilities) and the services available to your students to maximise their learning potential..

Supporting UG student writing

 For those who have been in academia for a while, a common complaint is that students are getting worse at writing. Furthermore, especially in year 1 and 2, students take a variety of different courses. They might write essay in different disciplines as well as lab reports and in each discipline they are expected to master the register, conventions and styles. From a student point of view, the difference are quite confusing and even more proficient students find it difficult to get it right straight away.
This session will provide practical suggestions about what you can do to support students' writing and potentially improve your own writing skills.

Supervising projects & dissertations

Some GTAs are charged with the supervision (either direct or as co-supervisor) of either undergraduate dissertation projects, MSc dissertation or assessed group projects.
These are an incredibly valuable learning experience as well as providing an opportunity to gain perspective on your own supervisory relations. Yet, these are quite different. This session is going to explore the nature of the supervision of undergraduate/MSc projects and provide practical resources to support your supervision task.

Being an effective lab demonstrator

 The task of a lab demonstrator is quite different from the one of a tutor. The setting is different, the type of activities to carry out are different and the role of the GTA(s) is different. Often lab demonstrators work in teams rather than handling a class individually and this creates an interesting scenario for teaching.
This session will look at different types of lab demonstration and will consider how certain types of teaching are more effective in this setting. We will also look at potential pitfalls and how to prevent common problems.

Giving lectures

At some point in their career GTAs may be asked to give a lecture or teach to a large class. Even though this might be a daunting perspective for many, giving a lecture is just a different way of teaching.
This session will provide an overview of what to expect and how to prepare for this type of teaching.

Designing learning experiences

This session will provide a useful framework to create effective learning experiences. The focus will go from the design of simple learning activities in class and will expand to the design of sessions or even an entire course.
We will leverage on a solid theoretical foundation to provide a practical approach to implement and evaluate the students' learning experience.