SPRING QUARTER 2015 — Information and Computer Science — UC Irvine
Advanced Teaching Assistant Seminar — ICS 398B
COURSE SCHEDULE AND INFORMATION
Quick links: Assignments E-mail archive References/Resources UCI's Teaching…Center
Instructor: David G. Kay, 5056 Donald Bren Hall. Stop by any time, or send electronic mail to "kay".
Meeting time and place: Tuesdays, 9:30 to 11:50, in room 5011 Donald Bren Hall.
Course goals: In this course we will cover teaching computer science and related disciplines at the college level, from the instructor's perspective. This perspective is useful even for students, as consumers of instruction, but we presume that participants in this course have some (perhaps tentative) plans to teach computing/math/engineering, whether through University Extension, Summer Sessions, or their own academic job. We will look at (and in most cases practice) designing and running one's own course, designing assignments and exams, setting grades, preparing teaching portfolios (records of your teaching for use in job applications and promotion cases), making curricular decisions, and other related issues.
Course requirements: This seminar is not designed to impose a large time burden on the participants beyond the class meetings themselves. Grading is satisfactory/unsatisfactory or pass/not-pass. But it is important that you attend the class meetings, participate in the discussions, and prepare for the various activities, which will include some readings and a variety of informal presentations leading towards your own complete design of a course. You should expect that in this course, as a seminar, the majority of the learning will take place in the class meetings. We know that as advanced graduate students, you may have travel obligations; we'll try to work around them, but it will be difficult if you anticipate missing more than two class meetings during the quarter.
Very approximate course schedule:
Week 1 |
March 31 |
Introductions and overview; planning a course |
Week 2 |
April 7 |
Clarifying curricular and pedagogical goals |
Week 3 |
April 14 |
Course design |
Week 4 |
April 21 |
Assignment design |
Week 5 |
April 28 |
Grading, plagiarism, managing graders |
Week 6 |
May 5 |
Exam design |
Week 7 |
May 12 | Evaluation alternatives |
Week 8 |
May 19 |
Setting final grades |
Week 9 |
May 26 |
Curricular issues, teaching philosophies, teaching jobs |
Week 10 |
June 2 |
Epilogue |