Ask-a-TAC: Answering Questions Via Email

Dear TACs:
How do I tell a student to stop emailing me questions that she could easily answer for herself if she bothered to, you know, open her notes/book or do a google web search or just think back a few days to the lab she just did, without discouraging her from asking questions she really does need my help with?
~ Over-Emailed TA

Dear Over-Emailed:
First, thanks for the great question! Often students do like to use their TAs as a personal search engine, and this can be flattering, but might quickly become frustrating. As a TA we want to make sure we are available to help (as you mention above) but we also do not want to get caught in some question-answering quick sand, right? Plus, an important part of our students' learning -- as we strive to help our students become independent learners and thinkers -- is to help them be able to search out and answer their own questions! So how can we make this happen?

The best learning does not occur in isolation, and letting your students know from the beginning what types of questions you will answer, and how, over email is important. I always encourage my students to get the email address of at least one classmate, that way if they miss lecture someone will have notes for them! Also, if you find yourself, in the middle of a term, answering repeated questions via email about "the answer to #3 is X, right?" or "I don't understand problem A. Can you explain it?" then it's worth taking a minute in class to re-address the issue. Have a discussion about what it means to learn-- mainly, that getting the "right" answer is often less important than understanding how to answer the question.

Without knowing your student personally, I'm going to hazard a few guesses and present a few scenarios. It is very possible that she looks up to you, and sees you as the best, most reliable source of information for matters related to the lab/class. If this is the case, you might want to think about how to instill confidence in her ability to answer her own questions. If the question is something to the extent of "what's the answer to problem 7?" maybe your email might begin with "That is a great question! I really think that if you take a closer look at X in lecture 8 you'll find what you're looking for. Let me know if I can help with anything else."  Alternatively, if you're getting questions like "I answered problem 3. Is this answer correct?" you might want to try "I'm so glad to see you are working on the practice problems. What area of problem 3 was particularly challenging to you?" or, pick out a specific portion of their answer and respond with a question "I'm not sure what you mean by xxx. Can you explain more specifically how it relates to the first part of your answer?" Some TAs might feel compelled to flat out say they won't check answers over email, because it creates different levels of advantage/disadvantage among their students, but they are comfortable discussing answers. However, maintaining a positive but firm, uncompromising tone via email is important. Heck, it might not even hurt to wait an extra hour (depending on the question) and write to say, "I just saw your email! I hope you were able to find the answer by going back through your lecture notes. Let me know if you have any other specific questions I can help you with."

And another scenario: she doesn't get it, and she keeps writing you with questions she should be able to look up. It never hurts to have a polite heart-to-heart by first finding out the nature of the issue. Is she missing lecture? Did she lose her lab book? Does she not have the email address of her labmates? Does she not use the chatroom? And then perhaps the following is appropriate "I am more than happy to help you understand and explore the concepts we cover in class. However, it is in your best interest to at least try an answer your own questions first before emailing me. I am always happy to help you with logistical questions, but when you ask questions about course content I need to know that you have attempted to find a solution before asking me. Also, I often find it easier to answer questions in person. Why don't you come to office hours or set up an appointment?"

And finally: in all likelihood this student is not lazy or annoying (although it might feel like it). In sending you an email they are demonstrating that they are trying! They may just need some holistic help in targeting their study efforts, or they may not know how to ask a more nuanced question about conceptual links. I hope that you will strive to help them be a confident, independent learner -- as frustrating as it is to have to answer their questions with a question!

Good luck,
Mara, TA Consultant

New TAC: Jamiella Brooks

Salut! !مرحبا As a new TAC I look forward to many opportunities to learn from my peers and to share my (sometimes off-kilter) ideas for teaching and pedagogy. I come from teaching English in a Los Angeles middle school called Maria Regina. Being around very energetic, very curious kids was a challenge (especially when it came to teaching a subject like English) but they certainly taught me a lot about patience and taking different pathways to instruction and learning.

In an age that is increasingly hostile to teachers, I aim to encourage and uplift others. A professor once told me that teaching is the most thankless job there is, and that will remain true until we find a way to be thankful for each other, and guide one another to be increasingly better at what we do. I believe that we are all teachers in some way, shape, or form--at the workplace, at home as parents, among our own friends; teaching and guiding is an innate quality of our being. As a TAC I know that I will be humbled and presented with many learning opportunities to refine and improve my own methods.

Here at Davis I teach French and have taken Arabic classes in an effort to look at the literatures and dialogues coming from places like Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco, which have a considerable French language influence and continue to be seated in post-colonial ideology. I am increasingly interested in linguistics, especially issues around second language acquisition and multilingualism. When I'm not teaching or taking classes I spend time in my community garden or can be found watching cartoons with my beloved husband and stepdaughter.

Konnichiwa Minasan

Hello Fellow Educators,

I am Jeff Anderson. As a new member of the TAC team here at UC Davis, I look forward to the many opportunities I will have to support educational development at this university. I believe teaching is an art best perfected with practice, creativity and feedback. I constantly look for ways to improve my own teaching, new ideas to support learning and methods to make the educational environment welcoming for diverse students. I am excited to be part of this team that will sustain this program and bring the benefits of our work to the larger teaching community here at UC Davis.

I am a third year mathematics PhD student. I do research in numerical linear algebra. My specific research problem applies linear algebra to analyze electric circuits. Main point: I use numbers to help make the computers you use run smoothly.

Outside of Math, I love to exercise, eat, cook, and learn about cultures different from my own (I am a Greek, Swedish, Spanish, English Californian. I was born and raised in the Bay Area).

Hi Everyone,

As a new TA consultant, I am very excited and look forward to work with TAC. I am interested in teaching, specifically in promoting student engagement in the classroom. In addition to be a Ph.D. student and consultant, I also teach at Davis Chinese School. I enjoyed teaching whether in university context or adult school setting. The more I teach, the more I enjoyed in it.

I am currently a PhD. Candidate in Education at the University of California, Davis. My emphasis area is educational policy and school organization. Currently, I am working on my dissertation on Student Engagement and Quality of Higher Education: A Contextual and Analytical Study of Current Taiwanese Undergraduates. My educational background is multidisciplinary from B.A. in Chinese Literature with minor in Foreign Language at National Tsinghua University (2001-2005), Master in Educational Leadership at The University of Montana, National Chengchi University (2005-2007).

When I am not teaching or writing my dissertation, I enjoyed spending time hanging out with friends, play board games and travel.

Hi, TAC blog readers! My name's Matt; I'm an anthropology PhD student and a 2nd year fellow and teaching consultant at The Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL). I'm excited to join my returning and new colleagues in sharing our knowledge, thoughts and practices with the wider graduate teaching community. And I'm especially excited about the possibility of learning about what has been happening in classrooms across campus. For all of us at CETL, teaching and making a difference in our students' education matters. We're ready to work with you to make your classrooms rewarding and collaborative learning spaces. You can find me in Young Hall 2Q; my office door is always open, and I hope you'll stop by to talk throughout the quarter!

As one of this year’s brand new TA Consultants, I’m excited to plunge into the work of supporting other educators here at UC Davis. Teaching has been one of the most rewarding aspects of my graduate career both here at UC Davis and at the University of Montana. It has also been one of the most challenging. I have probably encountered (or caused) just about every classroom issue you could imagine. Fortunately, I have benefited from excellent teaching mentors who have helped me to learn from these experiences, and I’m constantly seeking ways to improve my teaching. The more I learn about teaching, the more I enjoy it. I look forward to sharing this enthusiasm with other graduate students.

In addition to being a TAC, I’m a PhD candidate in the department of English with a Designated Emphasis in Native American Studies. I’m particularly interested in nineteenth-century American literatures and Native American literatures. My dissertation explores literary expressions of alternative nationalisms in the nineteenth-century United States, focusing on some of the different ways that nineteenth-century writers imagined the future of the space now occupied by the United States.

When I’m not teaching, reading, or working on my dissertation, you can usually find me outside. I love to explore California’s mountains, valleys, and coastlines.

NEW TAC: Dalia Magaña

¡Hola! I’m thrilled to be joining the cohort as a new TAC! Teaching has been one of the most rewarding parts of graduate school (most of us probably have this in common!). Teaching, to me means being immersed in a learning environment since not only do students learning from me but, I am also constantly learning from them. Student’s investment in learning has driven me to pursue a career where I will have opportunities to learn about the diverse approaches to teaching giving me the tools to provide fruitful outcomes for students. For these reasons, I look forward to a collaborative enriching opportunity as TA consultant to learn from others and share my experience and passion for teaching.

I’m a 4^th year graduate student in the Spanish Department where I have been teaching for the past 4 years. My research involves medical Spanish from a linguistic perspective (how Spanish speaking patients interact with their doctors in Spanish with or without an interpreter and based on this how to teach medical Spanish). In the future I hope to continue my research and specially continue teaching college students.

Aside from research and teaching, I don’t really have hobbies of my own at this time. For now I enjoy occupying my free time by my children’s hobbies: play-dates, watching rated G/ PG movies, bike-riding, Farmer’s market etc.

TAC Member: Sarah Dalrymple

I have been a TA Consultant for almost 2 years and this school year I have also been one of the TA Consultant Co-Coordinators. During this time, I have really enjoyed the opportunity to work with other graduate students to improve their teaching. My favorite aspect of the TAC position is that our interactions with TAs are mutually beneficial. I walk away from every consultation and workshop having learned something new. This has allowed me to improve my own teaching tremendously!

Sadly, I need to finish my dissertation and will leave the group at the end of the spring, but I'm looking forward to one last quarter of consultations! I'm pretty much the biggest fan ever of the Mid-Quarter Interview (MQI) consultations that we do for TAs. During the interview, students generate specific suggestions for how their TA can improve their teaching. Then the TAC shares the suggestions with the TA in a consultation afterwards. Having had an MQI done in one of my classes, I know first hand that the suggestions are helpful and that the interview itself can make a big difference in students' attitudes about the course and you, the instructor. I would recommend that everyone do an MQI if they are interested in improving their teaching!

I am a fifth year Ph.D. student in Population Biology and am doing my dissertation research on ants and fire severity patterns in the Eastern Sierra. This means I spend my summers in high dessert forests with perfect weather and picturesque vistas. It's not a bad way to collect data... When I'm not thinking about teaching or biology I also enjoy cooking, painting, and climbing, and figuring out how to work those activities into my work whenever possible.

New TAC: Heather Dwyer

Hey everyone, I'm really excited to be a part of the TAC group! Similar to a lot of grad students, I came here with no interest in teaching but quickly found that teaching is my favorite part of graduate school. As a TAC I'm hoping to help others improve and get more comfortable with teaching. I'm also excited to learn a lot from other TAs and spend more time talking and thinking about the classroom.

I'm a fourth year in the ecology graduate group and my research focuses on the response of butterflies to regional warming. In addition to being a teaching assistant a bunch of times, I've participated in teaching seminars and creating teaching tools. At some point I'd love to get some real experience in course design. I hope to continue teaching at the college level after graduate school—anything from intro bio to upper-level, specialized classes.

My interests outside of teaching and biology include art, literature, and exploring the Bay Area.

TAC Member - Ann T. Chang

Hello! I'm a 2nd year TA Consultant, a first year TA Consultant Co-Coordinator, and a 5th year in the Graduate Group in Ecology specializing in behavioral ecology.

I am excited to be serving the UCD graduate student community for another year. My career goals are to teach ecology and/or to continue helping others improve their teaching through learning and teaching centers like UCD's Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL). Being a TAC has helped me so much in my ability to react to challenges in the classroom that I find I am a much more confident instructor now. I hope to be able to pass that to my peers for years to come.

Outside of researching and the TAC, I like to knit, play with my dog, have marathon tv show watching sessions, read, and look for wildlife in urban settings. Long walks on the beach are great too...

I look forward to meeting you at the TA Orientation, in workshops, and in consultations!

The 2011-2012 new TACs cohort is here!

We are proud to announce the newest cohort of Teaching Assistant Consultants (TAC).

Senior TAC Coordinator – Mara Evans

TAC Co-Coordinators:
Sarah Dalrymple (Spring)
Ann Chang

Senior TACs:
Richard Osibanjo - Chemistry (Spring)
Matt Nesvet – Political Science

New TACs:
Jeff Anderson – Mathematics
Jamiella Ortiz Brooks - French
Hsiao-chi (Angel) Chang - Education
Heather Dwyer - Ecology
Erin Hendel - English
Dalia Magana - Spanish
Henry Yeung - Food Science/Nutrition

Congratulations to the newest members joining our group. Please stay tuned for profiles on each of the members of the 2011-2012 TAC cohort!

To Test or Not To Test?

After six weeks of discussion about student participation and engagement in our classrooms we arrived here: how do we know if our students are actually learning? Especially if we might find ourselves getting answers like these.

Participants in the last TA Consultant workshop were asked to evaluate different strategies for assessing and evaluating student learning. Participants were also introduced to and asked to analyze “backward design” strategies for lesson-plan development. We culminated with a discussion of actual assessment tools, including an in-depth discussion of the pros and cons of using a pre-post test (or “diagnostic assessment”) to gauge student learning. What follows is a brief description of our activities:

It began with a quick write. Take a minute and answer the following questions yourself:

Emily then led us on a discussion of backward design for lesson plans. Participants were asked to describe their basic protocol for developing a lesson or developing a course. It requires three steps:

1. Identify the desired outcomes of your lesson: what do you want your students to learn?
2. How will you know if your goals have been achieved? What evidence do you need?
   
3. Plan the activities and identify ways that you can help your students meet the desired outcomes.

Some participants already planned their lessons using this method, others used a more linear strategy (topic, activity, assessment, reflection). But backward design gets us started in a different place – we start where we normally finish—with the assessment!

We then moved on to a discussion about actual assessment and evaluation techniques. Different (broad) learning goals were posted around the rooms and participants had a chance to walk around in small groups and write down ways to assess if these goals were met. Goals included “Students will be able to organize and communicate their ideas” or “Students will demonstrate understanding content about a specific subject”. It was great to see ideas generated from other workshops pop on these lists (Blogs! Skits!). Individually, participants then walked around and read all of the suggestions and put blue dots by strategies they commonly used and a red dot by one example of an assessment strategy that actually evaluated teaching.

During our discussion we generated a list of direct ways to evaluate teaching. This included student evaluations at the end of the quarter, and mid-quarter interviews half way through. Minute-papers were suggested, where students are given a minute to respond in writing to the following questions “What did you like about class? What didn’t you like? What are you still confused about?”

So here’s a thought: remember that quick-write from the beginning? Take it again. Answer the same questions again! What changed?

The quick write was meant to serve as an example of a pre-post test you could give your students to gauge where they’re at with the material. We discussed the advantages and disadvantages of such an assessment. The advantages include: it doesn’t have to be multiple choice, it can provide students with some idea of what to expect over the course, it can help you tailor the course to their level. Some disadvantages include: it might make the class intimidating, it’s one more thing to grade, and it may not be the most accurate tool (especially if the questions are not worded well).

We ended as we do every workshop: with an evaluation! How appropriate for this time around, right? One of the questions on our final evaluation was: what other workshop topics would you like us to cover in the future? If you’ve been lurking, reading these posts, please comment! We would love to hear what you’re interested in!

And finally, a big, heartfelt thank you to the participants who stuck with us for all 6 weeks; we valued your participation, and we hope that you gained as much from this experience as we did!