Teaching Experience
At NC State, I taught PS 371: Research Methods for Political Science (Spring 2020, Fall 2020, Spring 2021) and PS 201: Introduction to American Government and Politics (Summer II 2020, Fall 2021). I taught both of these courses in-person and online. I was an adjunct instructor in Political Science at North Carolina Wesleyan College where I taught POL 112 American Political System in Spring 2021.
I enjoy learning from my students and teaching them. If you have feedback for me on different teaching strategies, teaching resources or other teaching related comments, please contact me!
Fall 2019: TA Experience
Spring 2020: Instructor of Record
I was a TA for PS: 201 American Politics and Government with Dr. Steven Green. I facilitated a weekly 50 minute discussion, in addition to course grading and providing student support. See below for activities I have used. I have also attached a form that I use to gather student feedback throughout the course.
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Feedback Form: I regularly use this short form to gather feedback from students
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Last Class Closing Activity: Discussion classes are interesting in that students have the opportunity to express themselves differently than they would in a traditional classroom. They form different relationships and have the opportunity to truly explore issues in a safe space. Sometimes, in order to end the course, a different type of activity is needed. Here is one that I used for my discussion class.
I was the instructor of record for PS 371: Research Methods for Political Science. I will be teaching this course again in Fall 2020 and have been planning for some changes. I will be using this summer to update this syllabus and the learning activities. Even though I shadowed this course in the Fall 2019, it is a different experience on the other side of the computer. Now that I have gone through that experience and I know more about the course, as well as what I expect students will learn, in addition to their feedback, I can make better informed decisions about instructional materials, common pitfalls and learning strategies.
Being a new instructor was complicated enough but COVID-19 imposed additional challenges. I will be adding a blog to this website about how I managed this but I did rework my course to be complete asynchronous with regular live zoom classes at our normal course time. I also provided students with much more communication and availability via zoom, email, google hangouts and instant messenger. See below for a sampling of my instructional materials.
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Spring 2020 Syllabus: This is my pre-COVID-19 syllabus. I found that some topics needed more time, while others could have managed differently. I will be making appropriate changes for Fall 2020. Going into the semester, I heard there was student anxiety about this course and so, using principles I learned in PA 885 and through the Graduate School's courses on teaching and learning, I designed more frequent assessments that had lower point values and incorporated group learning components.
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Revised Spring 2020 Syllabus: This syllabus reflects my changes after switching to online only. I can't take credit for the wording of the updated principles. They were created open access by Dr. Brandon Bayne at UNC-Chapel Hill. Resources and ideas like these to ease the transition and emotional toll were circulated widely in blogs and other higher education news and websites.
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Mid-semester Feedback: I designed this form to check in with students about the course. PS 371 is a required course for Political Science majors and I knew when I began teaching this course that many students leave it until their junior or senior years because the course has the reputation of being tough. I wanted to make it fun, bring down the anxiety, and make the connection between course learning and out of class real world experiences. But I also wanted to spark their interest in research! This feedback form touched on these issues.
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COVID-19 Technology Feedback Form: You are probably wondering why I have so many feedback forms! First, as noted in my philosophy, I believe in the need for student input. Enabling feedback systems can also result in student empowerment and self-directed learning. Second, it communicates care and consideration of student needs. Third, I need the feedback to make improvements and accommodations, especially if I need to adjust my expectations and learning outcomes. In this form, I needed to know what technology capabilities students had. I teach my students to use SPSS, which is accessible off-campus through virtual computing (VCL) but it can be problematic. My class and I tested VCL before the COVID-19 closing and there were significant issues. At this point, it becomes an equity issue and no student should be penalized for not having access to course materials during these extraordinary times. With the result, I adjusted my syllabus and expectations for the remaining half of the semester. Some adjustments I made based on this feedback include the following: I created an asynchronous course with short lectures (recorded and powerpoint available) that could be viewed with poor wireless access; I held optional live zoom lectures that were recorded and uploaded; exams were given open book and students had 48 hours to complete.
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A sample course lecture: This lecture displays the basic elements present in all my lectures: learning outcomes for the class, agenda for the class, review of important assignments, collaborative activities and opportunity for feedback. This lecture spanned two class periods.
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A sample course activity: I designed this activity to help students understand that research has a place in the "real world". Grading rubric is included. Based on what they had learned up to that point, they were tasked with assessing the quality of the research by examining the questions, hypotheses and supportive literature. They could get creative with their presentation, as well, because research is an art and a science! Student groups created poster presentations, powerpoints and pamphlets!