next »

[rk2009]

I got an adjunct teaching position for the fall at a prestigious university.  I am teaching an elective for first year graduate students.  I am thrilled to be able to get back into teaching.  It has been a long time since I taught.

Unfortunately, only three students turned up for my third class.  I had eight students in my second class.

At the end of my second lecture I asked my student to do a programming exercise.  I am guessing that the exercise was too difficult.  They chose to drop the class rather than do the exercise or tell me about the difficulty.  The class if for engineers, not computer scientists.

I am apprehensive that they may cancel the class.  I see no way to get back the students.  I feel it is inappropriate to email them.

I have a full time job in industry, so money is not the issue.  I am looking to get a faculty position for 2010.  So the experience is valuable. 

Some of the difficulty came from my background being mathematics and computer science, not engineering.  The course is on an interdisciplinary subject.  I had difficulty pitching the course at the right level.  I am articulate, so I do not think that is the source of the problem.

I appreciate any advice.
rk

[ph_free]

I see no way to get back the students.  I feel it is inappropriate to email them.

I don't think it's inappropriate to email them. Just make it very light-- I noticed you missed class on XX; hope to see you YY. Then, it seems like you need to adjust what you're doing in there. Talk to faculty in your dept about what sorts of assignments are appropriate for your student body and then prepare accordingly. I think teaching is a constant process of readjustment. If it seems disastrous one day, you have no choice but to go back in with your head high and try again. I hope they haven't already dropped your course. Otherwise, I'm not sure there's anything you can do.

[rk2009]

Thanks for your suggestion.

No I do not intent to give up.  I intent to continue trying to make the class interesting and relevant to the students, even though it is a lot of work and not much money.  I do enjoy teaching and would like to learn from this experience.

But I noticed that only 3 students are registered now for my class.  The rest have unregistered themselves.  I am not sure my emailing now can turn that around.

My fear is that the department may drop it.  It may not be profitable for them.

rk

[scampster]

At my school, they rarely drop classes after the semester has started. My advisor and I kid around about me registering for his classes to make sure they have enough people to go and then dropping it after the start.

Maybe other people's schools are different, but if they dropped the class, then it might adversely affect one of the three students remaining - there is a possibility it might put them low enough on credits that they wouldn't be full time and it would be hard to jump into a new class after the start.

[palla]

I agree with scampster.  Where I teach, they don't cancel classes once they have started.  It isn't fair to the students.  There are so many concerns (hours, FT status, financial aid, graduation dates) that they just can't cancel the class once it has started.

If they have not dropped the class, I see nothing wrong with emailing students.  I often email my students with a "We have missed you in class the last few days, and I noticed your assignment was missing..."  I don't think it is inappropriate, but I do think it would be inappropriate to email and say "I know my first assignment was a little too difficult, and I plan to adjust the work accordingly."  Not that you would do that...

[rk2009]

Thanks for your suggestions.

Unfortunately, the rest of the students have already dropped the course.  I will do my best with the rest of the students.
rk

[larryc]

Do you mean that now ALL of your students have dropped?

[rk2009]

No, just the five who did not come to the third lecture.

Three students are still enrolled.
rk

[larryc]

I don't think there is anything wrong with reaching out to the students who dropped and asking them why they did so. Explain that you are new to teaching and hope to improve as a teacher. Apply some skin-thickening cream before you read their replies, though.

[rk2009]

I sent a note to the chair and he said that while he normally likes to have at least five students, he will let it continue.

I hope I can do a better job rest of semester.

[abdbcb]

I can sympathize. I am in a humanities field coming from teaching graduate students to undergrads, and the game just aint the same. I knew this, and made adjustments, but not enough, apparently, as my reading and assignments scared away half the students in the first week. Now, with those who stuck it out I have talked about their expectations and developed some assignment options to meet everyone's needs. Seems like it has worked out. Also, a number of them mentioned that so and so dropped the class because they got into some other class, or switched majors, or whatever ie things that have nothing to do with me, and I think that happens a lot at a lot of institutions where there is a 'shopping' week. But getting to know the 'culture' of a school takes some time, and until you do that first day (or week) (or month) (or semester) can be pretty rough. Just be sure not to take it personally.

[kedves]

Get some examples of past syllabi for this and similar level courses from the department; pay particular attention to material covered, pace, and assignments (number and type).  If you can identify the department's learning objectives for the course, that will be helpful also.  Don't be an outlier.