Betsy McCall Teaching Portfolio - Duquesne University Fall 2003 Term 2

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Electronic Teaching Portfolio

Duquesne University, Fall 2003, Term 2

This course contains compiled evaluations for term 1 and term 2 of a 2-part (8 weeks each) of Calculus with Algebra I & II. Comments also refer to both courses.

1. Did your assistant attend class on Saturdays? (1=none, 4=all)	3.6
2. Did your assistant run study sessions during the week? (1=none, 3=all)	2.9
3. Did your assistant have phone-in hours during the week? (1=no, 2=yes)	2
4. All in all, was you assistant accessible? (1=no, 2=yes)	1.9
5. My TA was (5=very, 1=not at all) knowledgeable about the course content.	4.6
6. Effectiveness in teaching/communicating. (5=very good, 1=not good)	3.22
7. This TA was a valuable asset in this particular course. (5=very, 1=less)	3.7

Student remarks:

Almost no one commented, but my favourite (if only because it couldn't be further from the truth): TA had a glib attitude and was very condescending to trying to keep order for students who needed more help. TA was boastful about her accomplishments and website.

My remarks:

Both portions of this course suffered from one basic problem: the students did not come into the course prepared with an algebra background. Teaching business related calculus in 16 weeks is hard enough, but to also have to teach them the fundamental algebra techniques before doing that makes the situation nearly untenable. The student remarking above was upset about the way I ran the study sessions during the week. (Background: lectures are done on Saturday mornings, and a study session is held mid-week in the evenings.) I felt that the Saturday lectures should be for prepared examples and structured lessons, and that the study sessions during the week should be for addressing specific student issues, so these sessions were driven by the students' needs. The student complaining above wanted all the sessions to be structured, and despite my attempts to explain my reasoning calmly, she appears to have taken offense. Other students who took the time and continued coming to the weekly study sessions expressed to me in person that they felt they were helpful in the format I preferred. I also had a great working relationship with the course instructor.

The webpage for this section was dismantled but some supporting materials can be found here:
Practice Exam #1
Practice Exam #3
Exam #1 (Word format)
Key to Exam #1
Exam #2 (Word format)
Key to Exam #2
Exam #3
Key to Exam #3 (Word format)
Syllabus