this post was submitted on 11 Jun 2024
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[–] [email protected] 56 points 5 months ago (7 children)

Tertiary education: university professor.

LPT: Talk to your professor and ask questions!!

I have so many students that don't perform well because they didn't understand some material. I'm seriously getting paid to help you understand it, but I can't present it in a way that works perfectly for every student since they all have their own learning styles. I also wont know if they aren't getting it of no one speaks out.

I want:

  • to help
  • everyone to learn the material
  • to talk about science because I'm a super nerd
  • what is and isn't working for you in class
  • students to show up to office hours

I don't:

  • expect anyone to already know something they haven't learned about
  • care if you ask me a million questions
  • want you to perform poorly
  • want you do go to the field unprepared
  • like it when students treat me like they are bothering me
  • grade papers that are ridiculously wrong because students didn't try to ask me for help

The vast majority of university professors are obsessed with what they teach, so much so, that they made a career out of talking about it. Asking then about it would make their day. If you go up to one that seems like they're being bothered, then that's the exception. Don't let that one stop you from engaging with all of the others.

Note: This is true for almost all courses. However, there are some courses in certain universities that are considered "weed out classes". These classes, typically taken in the first 2 years, are informally designed to have lower performing students fail before they advance too far into the major and find out later that they don't have what it takes to be successful in the field. The professors of those classes are more commonly not helpful at all. Don't give me shit about it because I didn't design this system nor do I teach those classes.

[–] auzas_1337 4 points 5 months ago

Thank you for putting all of this so succintly. I’m not into teaching, but I’ve done a few workshops and I always struggle to express the attitude you described to get the pupils engaged.

I had this same attitude when I was a student. Even though my professors were older and more knowledgable, I always tried to approach them as peers and it worked out great. I’m not the sharpest tool in the shed, but because I talked, I could use my strengths better because I was more aware of the expectations and requirements than a portion of other students.

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