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If they love to teach, they should also get good at it, because being a good researcher doesn't necessarily mean that you're a good teacher. I'm saying this bec

by elbear 13y ago

If they love to teach, they should also get good at it, because being a good researcher doesn't necessarily mean that you're a good teacher. I'm saying this because, at least from the OP, Dijkstra doesn't strike me as a terribly great teacher.

GuiA 13y ago
How do you measure "good at teaching"?
- bennyg 13y ago
  The first key is the ability to recognize that a student or class of students is not understanding an explanation, and generalize it further or change the example to make it more clear. Do that ad infinitum (a really good teacher can get it right the first time). The second key is the ability to use examples that pupils find relevant and introduce topics that might not fit directly in the class description, but enhance overall knowledge with the intended discussion's knowledge. The third key is intangible. And that's the ability to make learning interesting, if not downright fun.
  - speleding 13y ago
    That definition would hold for the kind of teaching where the teacher transfers knowledge and skills to the pupil. Dijkstra was probably the type of professor that aims to inspire/provoke students into teaching themselves. I have a degree from a universities in Europe and one from the US and the European one had a much stronger emphasis on asking students to teach themselves (it was a Dutch university, Dijkstra was Dutch so I expect that's where he got the attitude), the US one had more "hand holding" in explaining what you needed to do. As an aside, the drop out rate at the Dutch university was over 30%, while at the American university I think maybe 2 people dropped out in my year. So while there is some consensus that teaching yourself is better than being taught it's certainly not very efficient.
    - oblique63 13y ago
      > So while there is some consensus that teaching yourself is better than being taught it's certainly not very efficient. So under which conditions is expecting your students to teach themselves better for them exactly? It seems to me that there's some sort of selection bias going on here if the best students are the ones that successfully teach themselves, and then reflect on the fact that they were able to teach themselves as the cause for why they were able to learn so well. I'm pretty sure that if you stuck a self-learning student in a hand-held environment he would learn equally well, but might risk learning less due to the natural time cost such a teaching style has. The logical conclusion for this are the whole 'advanced placement' classes and such, because like it or not, not all students are going to be equally well-suited to teach themselves, and thus endure poor teaching. A self-learner meanwhile, will be able to endure such poor teaching, regardless of whether they're even aware of how bad the teaching is. Teaching is not a fixed methodology, it's really an art that's quite broad in scope and requires honing in on each specific batch of students' needs. If you're going for 'mentor' style inspiration teaching, great -- but make sure you're applying it to a student that'll be receptive to it. If they're not, then maybe try to figure out how you can make them be receptive to it, but I guarantee you that it's going to require some level of hand-holding at the onset; and if you're a good teacher, you should be able to pick up on that.
      - speleding 13y ago
        Self learning allegedly yields better understanding and retention then other types of learning, so in that regard students who do not drop out would be better off. I agree that not every student may be able to get into the self-learning mode, although the success of Montesorri schools show that most kids can at least be able to at some level. If you are smart enough to make it into one of Dijkstra's classes, and aspire to comprehend the subject matter he teaches, then you should not need to much hand holding.
  - coldtea 13y ago
    >The first key is the ability to recognize that a student or class of students is not understanding an explanation, and generalize it further or change the example to make it more clear. Do that ad infinitum Em, that's spoon feeding knowledge to a group of random people, with no expectations from them or their previous qualifications. Might be OK for elementary school, but it's not a good definition for a university professor.
    - derleth 13y ago
      If effective communication isn't part of a professor's job description, what is?
      - coldtea 13y ago
        Effective communication is not dumbing down "ad finitum" as the parent comment suggests. That said, the major part of a professor's job description is knowing his shit, and being able to convey it clearly. This has nothing to do with whether the students can understand it easily or not. He could be communicating effectively (e.g as Knuth does in his Art of Computer Programming books) with the students still not getting it. Science is hard -- you have to work up to it. Merely getting some high level view spoon fed to you because you cannot/don't want to study and understand the actual science is not "effective communication".
        bennyg 13y ago
        I didn't say nor suggest the "dumbing down." An effective communicator gets his/her point across - that's the definition. Trust me, if you can't create another example or analogy off of the material you are supposed to be teaching, then you actually don't know it as well as you think. Simple as that.
        coldtea 13y ago
        I'm afraid ypu did. """the ability to recognize that a student or class of students is not understanding an explanation, and generalize it further or change the example to make it more clear. Do that ad infinitum""" You never examine the cases of students owning up to the work they have to do to understand in the first place. It's like as you describe a world in which they do everything perfectly, and the only factor in getting that knowledge into their heads is the professor and his "further generalizing".
- elbear 13y ago
  You can measure how much the students learned. I know that's not very easy though. You can also take feedback from students which could be useful, if you know how to collect the feedback.
MaysonL 13y ago
To judge for yourself, I'd suggest spending a little time on Youtube, watching him teach.

by elbear 13y ago

GuiA 13y ago

How do you measure "good at teaching"?

bennyg 13y ago
The first key is the ability to recognize that a student or class of students is not understanding an explanation, and generalize it further or change the example to make it more clear. Do that ad infinitum (a really good teacher can get it right the first time). The second key is the ability to use examples that pupils find relevant and introduce topics that might not fit directly in the class description, but enhance overall knowledge with the intended discussion's knowledge. The third key is intangible. And that's the ability to make learning interesting, if not downright fun.
- speleding 13y ago
  That definition would hold for the kind of teaching where the teacher transfers knowledge and skills to the pupil. Dijkstra was probably the type of professor that aims to inspire/provoke students into teaching themselves. I have a degree from a universities in Europe and one from the US and the European one had a much stronger emphasis on asking students to teach themselves (it was a Dutch university, Dijkstra was Dutch so I expect that's where he got the attitude), the US one had more "hand holding" in explaining what you needed to do. As an aside, the drop out rate at the Dutch university was over 30%, while at the American university I think maybe 2 people dropped out in my year. So while there is some consensus that teaching yourself is better than being taught it's certainly not very efficient.
  - oblique63 13y ago
    > So while there is some consensus that teaching yourself is better than being taught it's certainly not very efficient. So under which conditions is expecting your students to teach themselves better for them exactly? It seems to me that there's some sort of selection bias going on here if the best students are the ones that successfully teach themselves, and then reflect on the fact that they were able to teach themselves as the cause for why they were able to learn so well. I'm pretty sure that if you stuck a self-learning student in a hand-held environment he would learn equally well, but might risk learning less due to the natural time cost such a teaching style has. The logical conclusion for this are the whole 'advanced placement' classes and such, because like it or not, not all students are going to be equally well-suited to teach themselves, and thus endure poor teaching. A self-learner meanwhile, will be able to endure such poor teaching, regardless of whether they're even aware of how bad the teaching is. Teaching is not a fixed methodology, it's really an art that's quite broad in scope and requires honing in on each specific batch of students' needs. If you're going for 'mentor' style inspiration teaching, great -- but make sure you're applying it to a student that'll be receptive to it. If they're not, then maybe try to figure out how you can make them be receptive to it, but I guarantee you that it's going to require some level of hand-holding at the onset; and if you're a good teacher, you should be able to pick up on that.
    - speleding 13y ago
      Self learning allegedly yields better understanding and retention then other types of learning, so in that regard students who do not drop out would be better off. I agree that not every student may be able to get into the self-learning mode, although the success of Montesorri schools show that most kids can at least be able to at some level. If you are smart enough to make it into one of Dijkstra's classes, and aspire to comprehend the subject matter he teaches, then you should not need to much hand holding.
- coldtea 13y ago
  >The first key is the ability to recognize that a student or class of students is not understanding an explanation, and generalize it further or change the example to make it more clear. Do that ad infinitum Em, that's spoon feeding knowledge to a group of random people, with no expectations from them or their previous qualifications. Might be OK for elementary school, but it's not a good definition for a university professor.
  - derleth 13y ago
    If effective communication isn't part of a professor's job description, what is?
    - coldtea 13y ago
      Effective communication is not dumbing down "ad finitum" as the parent comment suggests. That said, the major part of a professor's job description is knowing his shit, and being able to convey it clearly. This has nothing to do with whether the students can understand it easily or not. He could be communicating effectively (e.g as Knuth does in his Art of Computer Programming books) with the students still not getting it. Science is hard -- you have to work up to it. Merely getting some high level view spoon fed to you because you cannot/don't want to study and understand the actual science is not "effective communication".
      - bennyg 13y ago
        I didn't say nor suggest the "dumbing down." An effective communicator gets his/her point across - that's the definition. Trust me, if you can't create another example or analogy off of the material you are supposed to be teaching, then you actually don't know it as well as you think. Simple as that.
        coldtea 13y ago
        I'm afraid ypu did. """the ability to recognize that a student or class of students is not understanding an explanation, and generalize it further or change the example to make it more clear. Do that ad infinitum""" You never examine the cases of students owning up to the work they have to do to understand in the first place. It's like as you describe a world in which they do everything perfectly, and the only factor in getting that knowledge into their heads is the professor and his "further generalizing".
elbear 13y ago
You can measure how much the students learned. I know that's not very easy though. You can also take feedback from students which could be useful, if you know how to collect the feedback.

MaysonL 13y ago

To judge for yourself, I'd suggest spending a little time on Youtube, watching him teach.