31 Instructing

No one taught me how to instruct. I learned by imitation. Unfortunately, imitation is not always the best form of flattery. There are various ways to teach that are appropriate under different circumstance and depending upon the subject. Colleges teach you how to do research but not how to teach. You are left to learn on your own. When I went to college, the typical professor taught five classes. Today, some colleges consider a professor to be full-time when he teaches two or three classes a semester. I use a variety of methods: lecture, discussion, small group activity or cooperative learning, slide-lecture or PowerPoint. You can show part or all of a movie or video to stimulate discussion. You can ask the students questions in class. Sadly, the best instruction in the world will not work if the student is absent or late. At a junior college that I teach at, the mat chairman harangued the adjuncts how they should employ better methods to stimulate the students in learning the various subjects. One instructor had the temerity to say it would help if the students would attend class. The department had a failure rate of 75% of the student taking the remedial courses. You can’t fuzz mathematics unlike other subjects.