The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of a teaching workshop on the teaching performance, teaching effectiveness, and the attitude of new biology graduate student teaching assistants (TAs) toward teaching and their students. / The curriculum of the workshop was derived from theory and research on effective instruction, including: skills of teaching, methods of choice in presentations based on learning styles, time and practice required for preparation, and an emphasis that a positive attitude toward teaching and students are all important to become an effective teacher. / This study was conducted as part of a regularly scheduled course at Florida State University. Of 32 graduate students, 20 participated in the departmental teaching workshop and 12 did not. All 32 taught three classes each of APB 1150L. The data was collected during the fall 1987, spring 1988, summer 1988, and fall 1988 semesters. Thus, the resulting number of undergraduate students who participated was approximately 2650. / The dependent variables, teaching performance, teaching effectiveness, and graduate teaching assistants' attitude toward teaching and their students, were all measured by the Student Instructional Rating Survey (SIRS), the Student Laboratory Environment Inventory (SLEI), final exam grades, TA interviews, class interviews, and an outside observer. / Analysis of the data collected supports the two hypotheses using the qualitative measures but only partially supports the hypotheses using the quantitative measures. (1A) A teaching workshop used with new graduate TAs does improve the teaching performance of those TAs in freshman nonmajor classes. Their performance is not significantly better than the nonworkshop TAs as measured by the data in this study. (1B) By involving each new biology graduate TA in a teaching workshop, his/her teaching effectiveness does not necessarily increase. The data collected in this study did not show a student achievement increase. (2) As a result of a one-week teaching workshop, the attitude of the new graduate TAs towards the importance of teaching was improved. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 51-01, Section: A, page: 0141. / Major Professor: Marcy Driscoll. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1989.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_78140 |
| Contributors | Lumsden, Ann Stephenson., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 141 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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