The SuperDozent/in: What Does S/He Look Like? S/he Looks Like This: S-D

For a beginning course instructor like me, there are a good many things to learn and improve. No, it is not enough to observe professors (especially at Fach parties :)) in order to educate your "instructorous" Self! Though, it is a quite useful practice in addition to reading books about teaching. There is a number of course instructors who inspire me to persuit my dream: I dream of becoming a Professor working with and for students. Such professors as Doctor Aron Brudny, Doctor John Couper, Prof. Robert Jewett, Prof. Martina Pfeiler, Mr. Valeri Hardin and a future professor Eriko Ogihara.

Today, I have read several anonymous course evaluation sheets I discovered in my mail-box. The general impression is: overall, the students who completed the course were satisfied! Of course, there were things I should have done better. For example, many students thought this course will be predominantly about the 2008 presidential elections in the U.S., but it was not the case. I have spent more sessions on the history of American politicosphere, than initially planned. I do have an explanation for that, yet I give credits to those students who shared these impressions. This only means one thing to me: if I do not want to be enslaved by my ascetic and non-explanatory course description published in the student course book, and if I want to avoid any confusions --- the course description should be as clear and explanatory as possible.

I have received very positive responses about the learning atmosphere in class, my abilities to trigger interest about the topics I teach, use of new media and EWS, the diversity of the tasks performed in class, the accessibility for a conversation and questions and the selection and quality of the reading materials. I am very happy that the students appreciated my efforts. Yet the very same reasons (in addition to something else... either my personality traits or the marsh-coloured jeans) made four of my students leave. Over-exposure to The Web can be exhausting and very intimidating to some students. In addition, I am a kind of a person who persuades other people, including students, to produce something on The Web, not just consume the digitalized knowledge. This is my philosophy of teaching: use, produce and share on The Web... This is not what every person might appreciate. It is enourmous stress to produce something special (like this or this). Consequently, here is my grading policy: every student who constructively manages the stress during a deep cogitative pause, then survives convulsions of creativity and produces something intellectual and special, deserves a good grade. (In addition, the student should pass the test.) This student, afterwards, is the most grateful one.

After reading the evaluation sheets, specially developed for Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik, I spent this morning on re-evaluating my strategies and approaches to teaching and learning.

I have spent more than an hour on translating the evaluation sheet, the copies of which are supposed to be distributed by the American and British Studies instructors. I do not imply I have waisted my time on translating the "Evaluationsbogen zum Seminar"; this was a great practice of my German! But I wonder how come there is no English version of the evaluation sheet for the course instructors, who speak no or poor German? We also have Erasmus students taking courses from Anglistik und Amerikanistik, who hardly speak any German! That's right, they speak English. And in addition to the course evaluation sheet in German, there should be a course evaluation sheet in English. Students should be able to understand the questions of the evaluation sheet in order to tick the answers they find appropriate. English speaking instructors should be able to read and understand what the student ticked about his/her course in the evaluation sheet. I think, I am talking about obvious things here.

Well, back to the content of the evaluation sheet and MY BIG Moment of Zen. Based on the questions and answers of the evaluation sheet composed for and about instructors dwelling in the Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik in Technische Universität, Dortmund, I have compiled a list of the characteristics of the local Super-Course Instructor, or SuperDozent:

1. The Super-course instructor explains everything clear and comprehensible.
2. SuperDozent/in (because the German version is shorter) summarises main historical events appropriately.
3. S-D (this is short for SuperDozent/in, who looks happy because he or she is... einfach super!) encourages independent research by providing guidance, if necessary.
4. S-D effectively allocates time.
5. S-D encourages students to approach ideas critically.
6. S-D encourages students to share their own ideas, knowledge and experiences.
7. S-D ???how can one translate that???
8. S-D is open for questions.
9. S-D is also available off-hour.
10. S-D's course plan has clear structure and comprehensible goals and objectives.
11. S-D's course requirements are easy to understand.
12. S-D delivers course material in such a way that by the end of the course the students are fit for tests and exams.
13. Despite the fact that the language of instruction is foreign (English!), the students taking this course are able to easily follow the S-D in class.
14. S-D's course should be engaging.
15. S-D uses different teaching methods in order to reach all students effectively.
16. S-D should be able to raise and satisfy the student's expectations.
17. S-D's course content corresponds to the course description available in the TU, DO course overview.
18. S-D implements audio visual teaching methods in his/her course.
19. S-D's audio visual materials are of a high quality.
20. S-D creates a healthy positive learning atmosphere in class.

So there you are 20 tips on becoming a Superdozent/in within the walls of the Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik in Technische Universität, Dortmund. I suppose, that's how S-D looks like after students' evaluations: S-DDDDD!!!