Day 1 of 3 of Teaching Assistant Training

7:15 - Arrive on campus. Frantically check the mailbox I haven't checked in over two weeks. Find an abundance of air particles.

7:30 - Actually check e-mail and other internet things. I'm a half hour early, but with Atlanta traffic, you don't want to gamble on time or the universe.

7:55 - Head over to where they're doing the initial orientation. I have a second breakfast of fruit and a dismal chicken biscuit. Awkward conversation with a pharmacology student, neither of us being awake or extroverted enough to talk to each other.

8:05 - See Tina, Brent, and others I know. Socialize with them a bit, grab information packets, discover amazing coincidences in schedules for the next couple of days, ask about each other's summers (or past few weeks), and other drills.

8:20 - Get herded into an auditorium. Introductions from the staff. "Discussion" of ethical dilemmas while teaching, consisting of a lecture. The day-long yawning commences.

9:30 - My first class, on technology in the classroom. Somewhat useful, since I've never actually edited Blackboard before, but also, a lot of it was, "If you need help, come see us!" At least they had good taste in music.

10:30 - Copyright issues! Perhaps my favorite class of the day, since this sort of stuff fascinates me. What can you use in the classroom? What constitutes fair use? What does copyright mean? Some time I want to assign a brief bit of a video game for class, if it can be made relevant, and so I could dive into the sticky widgets.

11:30 - Lunch! Pasta-type dishes, so it was pretty good. They didn't give us enough food initially, but luckily I got my food first, so I didn't have to wait for the second wave. They talked about health issues, counseling, and so on. Useful in information, though I wonder why, whenever sensitive emotional issues come up, the person on an informational DVD wears a sweater. It didn't even fit right!

1:15 - Grading and Syllabi! The professor who gave this presentation was meek. But he had lots of good ideas and observations, an open-minded old guard who put teaching first. He asked for our feedback the right amount. Overall, good.

2:30 - Strategies for engaging attention. These professors' strategies were to constantly ask us our best and worst classroom experiences, and questions about them, as well as explanations of what worked and didn't work. Useful, in the sense that they were able to succinctly list what we already know in some form. It got better, even though at first I feared that they were just winging it and stalling because they didn't come prepared.

3:45 - Diversity, the last class of the day. Three presentations, all useful. "You make stereotypes anyway, and I'll be funny about them, but you should be aware you make them," "Diversity happens in all of these different ways, and you ought to be aware of them," and "Be willing to talk about diversity when it comes up, while keeping your class on the material."

5 - Get charged $10 for parking, because apparently there's a difference between parking in the parking lot and the connected parking deck, where apparently we were supposed to park for free. Shake fist as I drive off.

I probably won't go into so much detail for my other two days. If I do, just for my benefit. Overall, I learned a lot. Sitting in classrooms for over 8 hours in a row is not my idea of fun, but at least it was somewhat useful.