Reflective Teacher Diary
A practical tool for beginning teachers and anyone who wants to improve their teaching; which encourages regular self-reflection before and after teaching.
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At the Faculty of Informatics of MU, we have been running a semester-long course DUCIT: Teaching Lab since 2016, designed (not only) for novice teachers from among the faculty's students. In addition, we organize open lectures or workshops for teachers and build a community of people at the faculty who care about improving the quality of teaching.
About the Teaching Lab course
The Teaching Lab aims to develop competencies for conducting beneficial workshops (called practicums). Through two-hour sessions , we gradually impart the "arsenal" for conducting quality teaching and explain "how it all works and why I do what I do as a teacher". It is then up to the learners of the course to apply these principles appropriately in their teaching.
We prefer teaching methods and tools that are informed by current scientific knowledge ( evidence-based teaching and learning), both in what we teach and how we teach it. We strive to be illustrative - when possible, we use examples of the tool or method rather than abstract descriptions. We name pedagogical concepts, approaches and problems to allow for effective discussion with other teachers and easier interaction with existing external materials.
We guide trainees to be independent in improving their learning in areas that are relevant to them. To complete the course, learners must create their own portfolio of different types of records, which each learner tailors to his or her own needs. We provide participants with an overview of recommended resources based on current scholarship.
We push for course participants to explicitly reflect on their own learning, both in and out of Teaching Lab classes. We encourage the practice of course participants listening to each other or to more experienced faculty, including follow-up discussions and two-way feedback between the visited and the attending.
The Teaching Lab was created and is still primarily intended for student practitioners at FI MU. However, we also welcome external students who want to improve their teaching among the course participants. The course has been taken by some FI staff members, students in teaching programs in fields other than computer science, high school teachers, or corporate programmers.
Topics covered in Teaching Lab classes include:
- Precedents and Standards (handout .pdf 110 kB )
- Interacting with a Group (handout .pdf 157 kB )
- Lesson preparation and objectives (handout .pdf 137 kB )
- Interaction with individuals (handout .pdf 329 kB )
- Motivating students (handout .pdf 122 kB )
- Variation of assignments and difficulty of tasks (handout .pdf 159 kB )
- Assessment and feedback (handout .pdf 121 kB )
- Structuring the lesson (handout .pdf 133 kB )
- Explanation (handout .pdf 142 kB )
- Effective learning (handout .pdf 115 kB )
- Ethical dilemmas (handout .pdf 156 kB )
Objectives of the Teaching Lab
- We work to ensure that practitioners enjoy their exercises and have fun learning.
- We work to make the lessons as beneficial as possible for the students and to be remembered as excellent.
- We work to make teaching through a community of practitioners a "killer feature" of FI MU.
Teaching Lab Projects
STACK: A stack of learning activities for computer science
An open-source collection of learning activities that promote active learning and better understanding of key topics in computer science.
Code of Ethics for Practitioners at FI MU
A non-binding document defining the standards of practitioners' approach to their teaching and to their students, agreed by the academic community of the Faculty.