Getting Started Guide for Technical/Vocational InstructorsMike O'Kane

Getting Started Guide for

Technical/Vocational Instructors

As a new technical/vocational program instructor you may feel unsure how to get started. Perhaps you bring strong technical skills and industry experience but have little or no teaching background. Or perhaps you have taught before but you're unsure about teaching in a community college and the range of students that you will teach. This guide is intended to provide a short, practical introduction to teaching technical/vocational courses in a community college environment. The material is divided into three general topics:

Preparing Your Technical/Vocational Coursediscusses: Designing outcomes and assessments; Developing learning activities; Preparing the syllabus, policies and schedule; Preparing to teach.

Working with Technical/Vocational Studentsdiscusses: Working with different types of student; Being fair to all students; Encouraging student learning; Maintaining control and discipline.

Teaching Practice for Technical/Vocational Instructorsdiscusses: Preparing for each class; The first day of class; Becoming a Learning Facilitator;Maintainingcourse records.

The guide also includes a useful teaching checklist and templates for important course documents.

1. Preparing your Technical/Vocational Course

It is important to take time to plan your course carefully, starting with the course description and ending with a syllabus and schedule. The first step is to determine your learning outcomes, based on the course description. Next you must decide how each learning outcome will be assessed (graded). Once you have defined your assessment, you are ready to consider what learning activities you will use to prepare students for each assessment. Finally you will be ready to develop a course policy and syllabus, including a grading system and course schedule.

Designing Outcomes and Assessments

Your department may already provide a defined list of learning outcomes that your course must achieve. These should be quite precise and easy to understand (if not, ask for clarification). If you need to develop the learning outcomes for your course, ask yourself: based on the course description, what should a student know by the time they have completed your course? At what level of mastery/cognitive skill? List each outcome separately and take time to define these carefully so that you can measure these effectively.

Now consider what assessments are needed to allow each student to demonstrate his or her success in achieving each learning outcome. Your assessment of each outcome can include a combination of different activities: quizzes and written exams; research papers; activity reports; hands-on activities; skill demonstrations; teamwork; classroom participation; special projects.

As you consider your assessments, keep in mind exactly what you want to measure and how you might best achieve this.For example, a student's project submission might need to be measured by more than metric:correctness (meets requirements), utility, teamwork, planning/preparedness, design, organization/coherence, documentation, testing, maintenance of equipment, originality, time taken, etc. It often helps to develop a grading sheet that lists each metric that you will use to measure the activity, with a percentage assigned for each metric. Grade sheets for each activity also provide documentation that you can use to show exactly how you arrived at a grade (PROVIDE SAMPLE ACTIVITY GRADE SHEET).

Some students are more comfortable taking written exams, while others find exams stressful and are more comfortable demonstrating their knowledge in other ways. This can be especially true in the case of technical/vocational students. So you might want to consider alternative options to assess the same outcomes. For example, you may want to offer greater grading emphasis for hands-on work.

Refer carefully to your course learning outcomes as you develop your assessments. Are all of your learning outcomes sufficiently covered by your assessments? Have you developed assessments that do not fit any learning outcomes? If so, should you drop the assessment or add a learning outcome? Are you assessing each outcome in proportion to its significance to the course as a whole?

Give some thought to how each assessment will actually be measured. In some cases an assessment will have a simple right or wrong answer, for example whether or not a machine part has been produced within acceptable tolerances, or whether a medical dosage is correct. In other cases an assessment requires more personal judgment, for example "how much did the student contribute as a team member?", or "how comfortable did the student make the patient?", or "how creative was the student's solution?"

Assessments that require personal judgment are often a necessary component of measuring learning outcomes. Be prepared to have your judgment challenged. Remember that it is reasonable for a student to want the best possible grade, so do not take challenges personally. Here are some approaches that may help you develop assessments that require personal judgment:

  • You should feel comfortable about your right to make a judgment even if this is challenged. You are the expert and it is a part of your responsibility to make such judgments to the best of your ability. It is also appropriate to listen to a student's concerns and consider changing your mind.
  • If another instructor is familiar with your subject, you might consider asking him or her to review your grade and give you feedback. Based on this feedback you may consider revising your grade.
  • As a part of your assessments, consider any or all the following: invite your students to self-assess; include assessment by other students (for example a team might assess one another, or the entire class might assess a demonstration); select students to conduct blind assessments of one another (the students are not aware of who they are assessing or who is assessing them). You may use your student assessments as a part of your grade, or you may simply refer to these when you determine your own grade. In either case, this approach can help to ensure objectivity when personal judgment is a part of the grading process.
  • If your assessments include team activities, be sure that your assessments will measure the team effort and at the same time ensure that a low-contributing team member does not benefit significantly from the efforts of other team members.

Developing Effective Learning Activities

Once you have defined your outcomes and assessments, you are ready to decide on the learning activities that you will use in your course to help your students meet the learning outcomes and complete their assessments successfully. These activities are likely to be a combination of lectures, hands-on lab work, video, field trips, guest lectures from experts, demonstrations, research, team work, independent projects, homework,exams, etc.

Consider carefully what is needed for each activity: time, equipment and tools (and maintenance), travel/reservations, setup/takedown. Consider how your assessments are to be associated with each activity. For example, if you include videos, guest speakers or field trips, you may want require students to completed short quizzes or reports so that these activities can be measured.

As you develop your learning activities you may find that you need to review and revise your outcomes and assessments. For example, often tools and equipment must be maintained as part of any activity. Do you wish to measure how much care your students take with tools and lab equipment?

Preparing the course syllabus, policies and schedule

Your course syllabus and course policies are extremely important documents that define the structure for your course. Both you and your students should take them very seriously. Your department or college may have specific requirements or templates for your syllabus and policies, or may provide you with these documents. In that case review these carefully so that you are fully prepared to work with them in your course. If you need to develop these documents, be sure that these will reflect your outcomes, assessments and learning activities.

Your syllabus and policy may be a single document or two separate documents. Your course policy should define your policies related to attendance and missed classes, classroom behavior, cheating, plagiarism, late submissions, grading, lab work and lab cleanup, incompletes, inclement weather, etc. Be sure to check whether your program or college provides specific policies and either copy these in your document or refer students to the office policy. (INCLUDE SAMPLE OF POLICY DOCUMENT).

Your syllabus should include your contact information, the official course description, a list of all required materials, a summary list of all graded activities, with grade percentages for each activity, and an indication of the grading system that will be used. (INCLUDE SAMPLE OF SYLLABUS DOCUMENT).

Your syllabus should also include your planned course schedule. A good schedule will allow both you and your students the appropriate amount of time to engage in and complete each learning activity. You will also want to ensure that the schedule incorporates your assessment activities. At least some of these assessments should occur at regular intervals throughout the course so that students receive meaningful feedback regarding their progress and can adjust their time and effort appropriately.

Consider making your course schedule a separate document from your policy document: this makes it easier to customize the schedule for different course sections and subsequent semesters. If you develop a separate schedule, you can include due dates: this establishes predictability and accountability for both students and instructor. (INCLUDE SAMPLE OF SCHEDULE DOCUMENT).

Preparing to teach

As you prepare to teach, consider:

  • Learning is the responsibility of your students. It is your responsibility to provide a structured learning environment. It is easy for a beginning instructor to focus too much on his of her "performance" at the front of the students. In fact your performance in the classroom may not be as important as the work that you put in to define the course structure, develop meaningful learning activities, and provide accurate assessments. What the students need more than anything else is to know clearly what they are expected to do and how they will be assessed.
  • Stay on track. It's great to provide examples and tell stories that create a relaxed learning atmosphere and add context to the learning material, but be careful not to wander too far from the subject. It's easy to get caught up letting the students know what you know, or responding to student questions that may not be relevant to the course.
  • Be honest. There is nothing wrong with not having all the answers. When in doubt (whether on a knowledge issue or a procedural issue) don't bluff. Just let your class know that you want to be sure you are providing accurate information and will get them back to them. And then get back to them.
  • Be fair and consistent. You yourself are an important part of the course structure You will confuse and upset your students if you provide inconsistent responses to different students or to students in different sections of a course. Follow your schedule, and if you need to change it be sure that students are clear about the changes. Use your textbook and any other materials that students were obliged to purchase. Adhere to your course policies and grading system. Do not deviate from your grading policy
  • Be patient. If you find yourself getting frustrated, talk to a peer, your department chair, or a college counselor. If you find yourself in an uncomfortable confrontational situation, let the student(s) know that you need a moment and walk away. If you need to talk to someone or simply calm down, take time to do that.

2. Working with Technical/Vocational Students

One of the greatest characteristics of community colleges is that they serve everyone! This section introduces the different types of student that you are likely to encounter in your classroom, and provides some pointers to help you work with all your students.

Working with different types of student

If you are new to the community college environment, be aware that your classroom will likely include quite a range of people with widely different backgrounds. Your students are likely to be of all countries, ages, races, genders, disabilities, and orientations. Some students may have been working in industry for many years, in a related or completely unrelated field, and now in need of retraining. These students may be older and nervous or self-conscious about being back in an educational settingor about their lack of current skills. They may be hard-working and willing to learn, and they may also be unconfident about their ability to learn. On the other hand, an older student may be very self-assured, may believe that they have a wealth of experience and knowledge to share, and may question your authority in the classroom.

At the other extreme, some students may be straight out of high school. They may or may not be highly motivated to learn, or may simply not have good study skills. They may be unfamiliar with the discipline and organization of a secondary education, and may not have learned to take responsibility for their own learning. But they may also be very bright and quick to learn and feel slowed down and frustrated by traditional classroom procedures.

You are also likely to have students who meet the criteria of the Americans with Disabilities Act. These students will require special accommodations in the form of equipment, assistants, or additional time for exams or exercises. You will need to take time up front to ensure that your course structure and activities will work for ADA students, and you may need to consult with your Student Services office.

Always keep in mind that your job is to provide a structure for learning that will support and respect all of these students. Be prepared to act as a mentor and a good listener. Be prepared to handle confrontational situations. At the same time, do not think that you must be able to help everything and everyone all by yourself. If you feel uncomfortable in any dealings with a student or class, or if you find a specific student is taking an inordinate amount of your time and energy, ask for help early on. In particular be careful not to become too involved if a student approaches you with personal issues not related to your courses. Your college will have professionals to help with special situations and concerns. And always avoid situations where you are alone with a student with a closed door. If any situation appears to call for this level of privacy, it should indicate that a suitable professional should be involved.

Be fair to all students

Be consistent your dealings with all your students. Act and speak professionally and be sure that your language is respectful of all cultures, ages, races, genders, disabilities and orientations.

Consider how different students will interpret your assignments and exam questions. Are they worded clearly and without jargon or colloquialisms? Can you be more inclusive by including different cultures, ages, races, genders, disabilities and orientations in your examples, exercises and references?

Be sure to follow your own schedule, grading criteria, and course policies in all cases. Consider making some allowances in your initial classes as students settle in, learn the policies and get used to your requirements. Follow your grading policy. Do not change your grading formula unless you make the change explicit to your students. If you do make changes these changes should be minor, for example if you decide to drop an assignment and modify the score of other assignments. It is not a good idea to add assessments to the course once the course has begun, or to make major changes in the way that students are assessed.

Sometimes it is easy to find your time and energy focused on students who are struggling in your courses. While it is important to help students who are behind or in need of help, be careful to give attention and encouragement to your better students. The converse is also true: be careful not to give all your attention to your "star" students at the expense of others who are struggling to get through the course.

Encouraging Student Learning

While a positive and enthusiastic instructor may help to generate a healthy atmosphere for student learning, this no substitute for a well-designed, well-structured and well-paced course. It takes time to develop an effective course so don't take it too hard when you see your students struggle and realize that your tried to teach one thing too many in too short a time, or that you missed an important concept that created confusion, or wrote an assignment or test ambiguously. We all do these things. Here are some pointers that can help: