Funding is the golden egg of graduate school. That golden egg, however, is not laid for free. Most of us who have funding are required to work with undergraduate students in some capacity, and for a good number of us that is the first time that we encounter students in a place where we are expected to be the knowledgeable teacher and disseminator of precious information. I have the benefit of having been a secondary school teacher for a few years before entering my doctoral program, with some of that time spent in schools in the United Kingdom. Over the course of being a high school teacher, with a year of experience as a teaching assistant under my belt, I’ve put together a list of suggestions for new GAs/GTAs as they enter the classroom for the first time. Keep in mind that everyone has his or her own style, and that teaching is a process – you will continue to learn, adapt, and evolve as a teacher and develop your own strategies for the classroom.

1. Learn their names. You do not need to play games or invent icebreakers to do this – you certainly can, but there’s not always time and depending on how you approach it, you may end up feeling more like a camp counselor than an instructor. Call them what they want to be called (within reason…I will not identify some of the names students have asked to be called here, but suffice it to say I would neither take them seriously nor expect them to take me seriously if I gave into their nomenclatural demands). Students like to be known as more than the collective “hey guys” or non-specific pronouns of you, he, she, and so on. Learning their names shows that you care about them as individuals, and, you can cold-call students who have not said anything to get them involved, and they then know that you notice them – there is no place to hide!

2. Think about how you learn best in the classroom – do you like lectures, discussions, group activities, using media and technology? Then, FORGET IT! Many teachers (myself included) start out by using those methods with which they learned best, forgetting that every student is different and also forgetting that you’re still in school for a reason – you love it! Not every college student has an inner uber-nerd, so change it up and break out of your own comfort zone.

3. If you’re leading a discussion section, DISCUSS! Sometimes setting the stage or providing some context for the readings is useful, especially when your class hasn’t had the lecture yet, but don’t talk the students to death. It’s really hard staring at a group of students, throwing out a question that you think is brilliant, and then having them stare right back at you as if you just threw a hissing cobra into the middle of the room. (Be honest – you did!) To avoid the saucer-eyed stare, use small groups and pairs to ease them into sharing-mode. Think about how you feel in seminar. Enough said.

4. Bring in fun stuff. College classrooms are sterile and un-inspiring. Which classrooms did you like best in elementary and high school? They usually had some color, some posters, some sort of unique desk arrangement. Who said college had to be boring? I bring in markers, play-doh, dry erase boards, and activities that are both challenging and engaging, but that are still in line with the objectives of each class. If students create or produce something, I take photographs of the objects and create a PDF document that I share with the whole class on Dropbox. You can see an example of this here. This also functions to give their work purpose, and makes great review tools for exams.

5. In reference to #4, have an objective! Teachers obsess over writing lesson objectives into their lesson plans, and I know I’ve had sleepless nights trying to come up with the perfect objective, to no avail. The habit dies hard – I write a brief lesson plan for each week of discussion – and include an objective to make sure that I keep the discussion and any activities on track. Bloom’s Taxonomy is a great tool to use to help develop objectives and ensure that you are getting students to engage with higher-order thinking skills. This is a great summary of the different levels and “question words.”

6. Surprise your students! Don’t do the same thing every week. You probably have an hour or less with each group every week, and you have to somehow accommodate all the learners in your classroom. Educational theorists proposed a variety of learning styles, types, and intelligences. Howard Gardner’s multiple intelligences, David Kolb’s learning styles, Carl Jung’s personality theories, are just a few, but some of the more prominent. Don’t ALWAYS start with the same activity. Use a video clip, music, a quote, photograph, cartoon, or a quick review game to get the class started. Keep an eye on news publications, follow Twitter feeds, or scan the local or college newspaper to draw on issues and events that might have relevance to your topic. When I taught high school, I wore a crown and passed out chocolate chip cookies on royal prerogative to introduce the French Revolution. Think outside of the box!

7. Know your stuff. You do not have to be a Yoda of your subject matter yet, but if you’re requiring students to read every week, so should you. If you don’t know something, admit it. Write it down, look it up, and report back the following week. Not only does this help your knowledge, but it shows students that persistence is important, and that a hallmark of an intelligent person is admitting what it is they don’t know, and going about finding it out.

8. Prepare for discussion like you would for a seminar. Read the assigned textbook chapters and the documents, if you have them. Reading a textbook is a skill, and I’ve had more than one student confess that they find textbooks difficult. I create a reading guide for each primary source chapter, and encourage students to use it as their reading. Those who do will find it useful when they begin studying for exams, and it also helps them organize their thinking for response papers.

9. Dress appropriately. You cannot get away with pajama pants, flip flops, and a t-shirt as a TA. You may be close to your students in age, but you don’t need to look like it. Wear your authority. On days when I am teaching, I wear dressier clothes – dress pants, a jacket or sweater, a blouse – you get the picture. When I’m just being a student, I go for a more casual look, but on teaching days I want to look like I belong in front of a classroom. Illinois State University’s requirement that business students wear business-casual clothing for their classes raised some eyebrows, but they had the right idea. Your self-perception changes based on what your wearing, as does the way others perceive you. You are a paid employee in a professional setting, so look like it.

10. Finally, have fun. If you do not find teaching enjoyable, you need to rethink your career path. Universities today are not looking for professors who only do research and write books. While that is still important, so too is their classroom presence. After all, you want to attract students to the program, not make them run away screaming. When I was an undergrad students signed up for some history classes just because they’d heard the professors were great teachers, not because they were history majors. Your goal on Rate My Professor should NOT be to get a chili pepper, but neither should it be to get 5 stars for easiness. Be rigorous, challenge your students, be accessible (i.e. office hours, email, before & after class) and have fun. If you have fun, so will they.

**This is NOT a complete list by any stretch of the imagination. If you want more tips, advice, or suggestions, please comment!