End of Quarter

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Well, I finished up my first quarter of teaching yesterday. Overall, I’m definitely very satisfied with the job I did and the way the students performed. My grade distribution for the two classes turned out to be the following:

 

A’s: 31%

B’s: 31%

C’s: 15%

D’s: 8%

F’s: 8%

W/D: 8%

 

I think that’s a pretty fair distribution. Also, I’m particularly happy that my own subjective evaluation of the student’s work in class matched up well with how they scored on the more objective tests. Or, to put it more simply, the students who I think actually knew the material the best are the ones who ended up with the best scores. I’m not sure that always happens in a lot of academic classes.

 

Anyway, I’m teaching two classes again next quarter, but this time they are both in accounting, which is good since I was never entirely comfortable teaching the Microsoft Excel class (and, admittedly, feel in particular uncomfortable with the fact that a student failed it, because I know I was lacking in some respects as a teacher in that class).

 

My one major complaint with the teaching experience so far is not having enough control over how the classes are structured. The syllabi are prepared for me and I’m supposed to adhere to their guidelines, whether I agree with them or not. The student who failed the excel class (she’s the elderly lady I’ve mentioned before) complained about the fact that I never actually lectured during the class and it’s frustrating to me that she’s right, I didn’t, but I didn’t really have a choice because I don’t choose the class structure. Which is frustrating.

 

But I suppose that isn’t too bad seeing as it’s my biggest complaint. Well, that and the fact that I’m making 1/4th what I did at my first job . . .