Monday, October 8, 2012

How to be a good teacher

The title i chosed this time, sound so simple, easy to say, but yet not as easy as it looks to be one. To be a good one means to be the preferable, the best you could do, and the kind of student like most.

Rule number 1 (Know Your Student Well)

Today i prefer to discuss what it's need to enable you to be a good teacher as deserved by your student. First it's very vital for a teacher to know well their student. Not that hard, coz the first thing when you need to do is to get acquainted with them. Get their names and try to capture the names with the face. So how to do that when you have so many students???. How to remember every names, how to recall which one is which and whose name belong to whom?

So, here are the tips.
1. The first class, instead of just deliver the course content to cover for the whole semester, what is the evaluation required, what student should do, what they should get, etc....,  (though these requirements are important too, but keep it second).  Introduce yourself, tell the student where to find you, or just let them have your phone number or email address. Ask them what they need to know about you. Therefore the student will feel that you are closed to them, and they know well where to find you when they need you.
2.  Let them introduce themselves. Instead of  only their full names, let them state what is their preferable name need to be address later, their home town, their hobbies, etc and what is unique about them that differentiate from others. This unique thing, make they are easy to be identified.
3.  After they have introduced themselves, just go round the table (the class) each one, try to say again their preferable name that you could remember. If you have a very good memory, sure you could easily say one by one perfectly. But don't worry, not everyone in the world can easily memorize thing perfectly, at least you tried to show them that you have taken the first step, the first iniative to get to know them.
4. The next step remind them, the next time they come to class, please have with them a paper stands on the table(near their seat) to show their names. (Actually you can ask them to fold an A4 paper into three, write their name in the middle part of the paper creatively, and put them nicely with them. If you are standing in front, and they are sitting far far away at the back, you can still see the name on the table. Each time, when you have an interaction with them in class just call their name. I'm sure your student will feel so overwhelmed when they know that their lecturer/teacher knows and can say their names correctly.
5. When you have memorize most of their names,  let them take away the A4 paper with their names, just call them as the names the remembered. They sure appreciated your effort.
6. When the student knows that you can say their names and can identify which names belong to whom, they sure feel so close to you. And of course when you are close to them, whatever contents, whatever knowledge you need to deliver can be done good enough.
7.  But remember this is only the first step, wait for the next edition of this.

Hmm, the second rule will be coming soon. bye for now.