Apr 4, 2008 | Life, Another One of Those Episodes

So after nine weeks, my web design course is over. It started with two dozen enthusiastic students from all classes, and ended up with five. Perhaps the most proudest end result is the Nolarize! website, created by Greg Albright ’10. It’s pretty amazing what a nine-week, three hour a week program can do. There were a lot of things I didn’t quite cover to the extent I had hoped, and a lot of things that ended up being shuffled around (and it became difficult to handle the ins and outs of students who weren’t sure if they could attend all the classes) but I think in the end it did give me a lot to learn about too.

1. Teaching is fun in part because the rewards reaped from it are so much more than the simple transmission of knowledge from one person to another.
2. You really need to be prepared. I think I wasn’t as well prepared for the class most of the time, and when you hear about professors who spend forty hours preparing for a single class, you wonder where you can actually stop preparing.
3. The toughest thing is finding the right balance. Some people learn faster than others, and it’s difficult to walk the fine line between maintaining the right pace for instruction and making sure everyone in the class is on the same playing field.