Developing A Global Real Time Assessment Tool For The Teaching Enhancement Of Engineering Graduate Teaching Assistants

In 1999, the VaNTH Observation System (VOS), a direct observation system that records instructor and student interactions in classrooms using the dimensions of the “How People Learn” (HPL) framework was developed to provide pedagogical feedback to bioengineering faculty at four research universities. Since its development, the VOS has been adapted for use in first year engineering laboratories taught by the graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) at a large Midwestern university. After piloting the VOS within this new environment in 2007, researchers noted some limitations. To overcome these limitations, a new pedagogical observation system, called the Global Real-time Assessment Tool for Teaching Enhancement (G-RATE), has been developed to provide GTAs with multidimensional feedback about their teaching. This paper describes the evolution of the G-RATE system, provides an overview of each section of the instrument, and discusses future steps for the development of this tool. Introduction Seymour et al. 1 note the importance of pedagogical feedback for graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) in a variety of disciplines. In a comparison of GTAs teaching in innovative and traditional course environments, the authors identified GTA responsibilities in traditional environments to include grading, working closely with undergraduate, and serving as secondary resources for students enrolled in the course. Within the innovative environments, however, GTAs were found to be troubleshooters, liaisons between faculty supervisors and students, and collaborators with faculty in the teaching of students enrolled in the course. Because of the important roles that GTAs play in both traditional and innovative environments, feedback to GTAs about the extent to which they are fulfilling their teaching roles is needed. Although such feedback has been traditionally provided by GTAs’ coordinators or supervisors 2 , by GTA self-reflections 2, 3 , by undergraduate students’ evaluations 4 , or by other surveys 4 , direct measures of GTA effectiveness are needed also. For this reason, this paper describes a new pedagogical system, the Global Real-time Assessment Tool for Teaching Enhancement (G-RATE), which has been developed to provide GTAs with multidimensional feedback about their teaching. This paper describes the evolution of the G-RATE system, provides an overview of each section of the instrument, and discusses future steps for the development of this tool.