Which topics to include in a teaching presentation?

Question

I have been shortlisted for a lectureship position. The committee has asked me to present a 10 minutes (!) lecture on teaching game development topics to undergrads. My teaching experience amounts to TA roles during my post-doc and PhD. I am familiar with the topic however at this career stage I have not yet had the opportunity to manage a university course on my onw.

Given the time constraints, what would you (search committee) want to see in one such presentation? The overall course structure? Assessment/project ideas?

Answer 1

My content area is biology, and our major biology education research journal recently published a nice overview on this (open-source reference at end). Hopefully the results are relevant for your field as well.

• Make sure content is correct
• Follow instructions (keep to time limit and topic)
• Make the topic relevant (bring in a hot topic from research or news)
• Involve the audience (have an activity or "clicker question")
• Have teaching slides or use the board

I'd recommend trying to find a course (at the interviewing school or at a similar institution) that has an online syllabus so you can see how much is normally covered in a lecture. Then your first slide can be one that shows how you would cover the day's content, but places your 10 min talk in context. This is helpful if the "fun" part you want to do is in the middle of the imaginary lecture.

Then, pick something from the course that you think you can create an activity about. Can the audience develop something? Vote on an aspect of the code? Work in groups to find three common errors in a short piece of code? (I'm flailing around here, as game design is a mystery).

Build your lecture around that activity. Have the activity near the beginning. Plan on everything taking at least twice as long as you think.

Be enthusiastic.

Congratulations on the invite, and good luck!

Smith, M. K., Wenderoth, M. P., & Tyler, M. (2013). The Teaching Demonstration: What Faculty Expect and How to Prepare for This Aspect of the Job Interview. CBE-Life Sciences Education, 12(1), 12-18.

Answer 2

I think Adrienne's answer is quite good but I will add a few comments after recently being on the interviewing panel watching about 20 such sample lectures.

The goal is for them to see how well you can teach. Domain knowledge is important but if you cannot deliver it well then you will be a bad teacher...so they want to see how is your delivery.

I think it is unlikely they care about assessment at this stage (though that question could come up after your sample lecture). I believe it is really about seeing how well you can teach.

Adrienne's idea about activities supports the idea of active learning which general results in improved learning than the "stand and deliver" method. So, definitely do that.

The one breaking point I've seen in the past which can push you over the edge (in the good or bad way) is the panel asking themselves "Will our students understand this teacher?" It would help if you knew the level of the undergrads who would take this (first year? fourth year? overall quality of this school's students?) so you can target that level.

Watching other teachers is great but make sure you are watching the teacher which are actually getting the students to learn.

I've seen many colleagues (on the panels) make deciding comments like:

• I think she teaches at too high a level, not a good fit
• He used examples which were very easy to understand, our students would get that
• She adapted very well when the projector failed and could jump to the board and continue the lesson

Understand that those observing you might or might not have a background in the topic. Assuming you will be teaching first year students, pick a concept which would normally be taught, ideally one which is not so easy for all students to understand, and show that you can make it very easy to understand. Activities are a great way to test for understanding.

Good luck!