Teaching High

No, this is not a post about teaching while stoned or otherwise 'high' on drugs...well except for coffee.

I frequently tend to post about my teaching when it isn't going well or when something bad happens (see my last post, for example). Today, however, I'm feeling great about being a teacher, so I thought I'd share that enthusiasm with you.

I may not have explained that I am pretty busy with teaching this semester. I mean that I'm busy for a graduate student, not for a 'real' professor, nor for a 'real' teacher of primary or secondary school. Like last semester, I am working as a Supplemental Instructor, holding two one-hour discussion sessions per week, for the class for which I am a T.A. In addition to this weekly lesson planning responsibility, the professor of the class requires me to lead discussion in class every Friday over the week's reading assignment.

This morning I led my third of those reading discussions, and it was fun. I know I made many missteps: I asked awkward questions that I struggled to rephrase. I forgot a student's name. I asked questions that were fishing for answers that didn't yield fruitful answers. However, I recovered from these missteps, and by the end, I think that the students and I had each genuinely learned something from the text. We did our best to grapple with things learned from art history and architectural history, and saw how they might fit into some of our larger class themes. I enjoyed it.

Afterward, several of the students told me that they thought that discussion went well, as did the professor. I then met with a student who wanted to review lecture notes from Monday. I remembered important points and did a decent job of explaining things. Basically, I felt like I connected with the students and handled difficult and unfamiliar material well.

The whole day, and really the whole experience of teaching more frequently and more intentionally this semester has persuaded me that being a professor is something that I will enjoy. Of course, I will still be stressed out periodically about the fact that I can barely get any writing or research done while trying to teach at the same time. Discussion won't always be energizing for me or the students. Nevertheless, I feel good today. I have the makings of a good teacher. I can do this.