A student came to interview me yesterday for a project which required students to interview a professor they find interesting about teaching and learning. I will reproduce the interview here because it was lots of fun to answer the questions.
Q.: How long have you been teaching?
A.: This year, I will celebrate the 20th anniversary of my teaching career. I'm not ancient, I just started very early. [The last statement was in response to the interviewer's incredulous look.]
Q.: What makes a bad student?
A.: In my teaching philosophy, there are no bad students. There are only students who did not receive enough attention, encouragement, and support from the teacher.
Q.: How do you find a balance between work and personal life?
A.: In our profession, it is very easy to do so. We only have to be at work 2 or 3 days a week, seven months in a year.
Q.: Then why do so many professors complain that they are overworked and never have time for anything?
A.: I guess they are a lot more responsible than I am.
Q.: How do you preserve your enthusiasm for teaching? I often see professors who look like they don't even care. How do you avoid that?
A.: I'm sure they care a lot. Everybody's teaching style is different, so some people are not as demonstrative as others.
Q.: What advice would you give to freshmen?
A.: Dedicate your first year of college to learning how to learn.
4 comments:
Does the workload you described mean that you do not consider scholarly work and research to be working? I spend a lot more time than that on my work, although the teaching portion could be described that way. If the non-teaching part is play instead of work, then that fits, I suppose.
I really enjoy your blog.
Thank you so much!
By "work" I mean having to be some place at a defined time and not being able to leave whenever I want. :-) Research for me goes under the category of fun. Right now, for example, I'm reading detective novels in preparation for a conference in May. That really doesn't feel like "work." :-)
Although, the irony: I thought a professor job would be like that, but most of mine have had hours that look more like banker's hours due to scheduling of classes and meetings!
Although, the irony: I thought a professor job would be like that, but most of mine have had hours that look more like banker's hours due to scheduling of classes and meetings!
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