Strengths & Areas of Growth by Vi Tran Huynh

Addisin Matthews

2023-09-14 21:46:42 UTC

2 strengths and why
2 strengths are that it gets the students talking about the work and helps others know potential places of errors. Strengths because it allows for students to know what they did wrong and why.
2 ways for growth and why
Students tend to pair off with same people and it stops being effective and students can pretend t9 talk about work while waiting for answers. I want to be able to change up groups for students to experience a wide array of people who can know and help them instead if the same people.

Anna Grace Richard

2023-09-22 13:55:43 UTC

2 strengths in implementing collaboration is to get students to talk and work out problems together and also it helps just their overall collaboration skills. This is because in the professional world, collaboration is just a good skill to have.
2 areas I can grow on this is to let them do more thinking and then collaboration because I think I need to give them more time to think by themselves before giving them help.

Cheniah Hosam

2023-09-29 20:55:12 UTC

2 strengths with implementing the collaboration point of view is allows the students to work with each other to solve problems and I think that especially in mathematics that would be effective as they can leave from each other. This also helps them improve with team work as other classes or jobs may require them to work in groups or teams to get things done. Two ways I believe I can grow in are working on being a better facility of group work rather than answering the students questions myself as well as being patient with the students as they figure it out with each other and let them find their way to an answer

Sam Victorica

2023-09-29 21:16:31 UTC

I find that many of my students work well together and I make a comfortable environment for them to collaborate.

My primary weakness is likely the inability to detect non assignment based discussion as I deal with a 50 person class. I feel that I could also encourage even more collaboration.

Joshua Kota Gray

2023-10-20 22:50:26 UTC

I am an LA for Studio I in architecture.

The closest approximation I could give for the kind of class this is, is an art class, perhaps a sculptural or pottery class specifically.

2 Strengths for Collaboration
In the professional world, collaboration occurs at 2 levels, one of which is in formal group meetings where teams of people are working together and organizing on a project.
If they can collaborate in this way, then they are learning a vital professional skill that they would use in the future, which they do eventually practice in the upper years.

While they are ultimately working on different things, their own projects, they can learn a lot from each other as they see how each other person thinks and obtains a slightly new, slightly different perspective, that informs their lexicon of understanding, which happens throughout really every class every year in the program.

2 Areas of Growth

As was said formerly, in the professional world, you often have teams of people working with other teams to coordinate on a project, such a counterpart for first years might be excessive, but if it were to be or had to be implemented, then it could be done that the class is split into pairs, and they would have to plan two separate halves of a project that had to come together while still meeting the learning outcomes and expectations of the class.

In upper year studios or where the class is expected to come together to assemble a site model, collaborating outside of class and in modes other than in person, can be a challenge where I think if I were in the position of an LA where the class is doing this, I would want to take a very active role in helping to keep them on track and encouraging them to keep up with each other through various group messaging platforms like Teams and GroupMe.

Jonathan Westmoreland

2023-10-20 23:43:26 UTC

Working with other students who will stay on task and engage in critical thinking regarding the subject would be a strength in my situations.
Also sharing and explaining their thinking with logical reasoning and conveying their thinking to the class and or the person that they are working with would be another strength.

Improvements on introducing students to others in the class in order to get name recognition and get familiar with the students inside the class.
Along with Individuals tend to have preferences whether to work with others that they have never worked with before. Whether that is based on friend group isolation or preferences not to work with other people that they don’t know.

Tulsi patel

2023-10-21 18:07:02 UTC

2 strengths would be working with students to help them solve the problems and promoting engagement with other students to increase the level of understanding.
2 areas of growth would be trying to be more connected to students in my LA class and trying to be more confident while talking with them.

2023-10-24 21:52:05 UTC

Two strengths can be the use of adding a group discussion to find a particular probelem when it comes to an auto as issue or rendering problem. 2 things to grow on are the need to implement way where more engagement to the class

Garrett Byrne

Katie Brady

2023-10-27 05:32:09 UTC

I think two areas of strength I have are in my ability to break down topics into simpler ideas and facilitating personal growth through leading questions. With larger subjects like accounting, there are often very broad and intense topics being thrown at students. I do my best to take that topic and break it down for them to help keep from getting so overwhelmed that they’re not able to truly learn the topics at hand. I think I also do a good job at using leading questions to get students to reach their own conclusions and get the right answers. I pose questions as instead asking for definitions of the answers to them, use them to break it down into multiple steps rather than just going in headfirst to the big picture, and help students refer back to their older work and prior knowledge. I think that something I could improve on is my ability to get students to collaborate; my students have been very defensive towards working together to solve problems, rather than just asking me or waiting for me to review practice problems. I think I need to do more work to try different methods and approaches to collaborative learning to get students talking to each other.

Jaden Means

2023-10-27 23:36:51 UTC

A strength that I have is being able to ask them questions to further their learning. Instead of giving them the direct answer, I like to ask them questions that allow them to figure it out on their own. Additionally, I try to be empathetic to show that I understand and that I’m here to assist. Two things I need to work on are initiating the interactions and having them work together.

Jade Valeris

2023-10-28 01:35:50 UTC

I make a good effort to encourage students to talk with their lab partners during the lab. Because of my efforts along with the TA's efforts, many of the lab partners are becoming friends and a lot of the pairs work very effectively together. However, some pairs don't work as effectively; they often get distracted during the lab because they have off-topic conversations or talk during the pre-lab lectures.

Samuel Subramanian

2023-10-30 04:26:36 UTC

I’ve encouraged students to come up to the whiteboard and attempt working problems, while their classmates assist them if they get stuck. 2 strengths of this approach are that students get experience with actually writing the answers out themselves, which will be crucial during the tests, and students feel more comfortable, attempting a problem if their fellow students are helping them. 2 areas where this approach could be improved are that it’s a difficult take get students to attempt questions on the whiteboard and that sometimes none of the students know how to proceed with the problem.

Lauren Snider.

2023-11-08 15:51:51 UTC

I believe that two areas of strength have been using breakout rooms for discussions, and asking students to pair up to edit and talk about each other‘s work. Two areas that I need to work on growth in is fostering discussion during class, and trying to get students to collaborate more. usually the second they are done with whatever task they have been assigned. They don’t talk anymore.

Megan McCabe

2023-11-09 22:58:50 UTC

Two strengths: getting students to discuss problems together and mixing up which students are paired

Two weaknesses: keeping students on track when they're working together and using a variety of group activities (usually it's just practice problems)

Erin Burke

2023-11-10 20:27:30 UTC

I believe that I can improve by implementing more learning strategies to help the students with their learning. To improve this I want to try new collaboration methods and see how the students work with them.

Logan Entrabartolo

2023-11-11 11:58:16 UTC

Think/pair/share is a go to technique when it comes to collaboration in math. The 2 strengths of this is that it enables two students to engage with each other who may not have often interacted. Another strength is that they can both learn and bounce ideas off each other.

I can improve on this technique by being more involved and/or holding the students accountable by asking them to come up and teach the class the topic, or maybe switch partners after a while to combine to jigsaw and think/pair/share.

Anna Yancey

2023-11-19 23:52:21 UTC

My strengths are that I create a place where students feel safe and comfortable enough to answer questions, even if they don't know the answer. Also, I'm open to trying many different types of activities to see what students like the best. I can improve in making my activities more learner friendly as some people get intimidated to come up to the board. Another area of growth for me could be to better facilitate by redirecting 1-on-1 questions to other students or to have them look for it in their notes/lectures.

Penelope Rodriguez

2023-11-26 05:54:06 UTC

My strengths are that I tailor the breakout sessions to what the students are feeling that day. Sometimes we work on it together or they prefer to do it individually. Also students ask me lots of questions which is a good thing because they feel comfortable. A weakness is that a lot of times I have a hard time getting the students to work together in groups. I think implementing different collaboration techniques might help me in the future to get them to be more comfortable working together.

Madison Wall

2023-11-27 04:30:07 UTC

My two areas of strength include breaking the groups into smaller clusters and communicating with students myself to help deepen the conversation. I think helping students engage in a meaningful conversation is even more important than being put in the groups to begin with.

Two areas I could improve upon include being careful when getting quieter students to talk and keeping a closer eye on students making sure the conversation is staying on topic. Its difficult to keep track of so many students conversations at once.

Roger Brown

2023-12-01 17:05:26 UTC

My strengths are being able to facilitate group discussion if group members are initially hesitant to work together. Also, I do well in identifying individuals who would work well in a group.

An area where I could improve is diversifying my strategies

Mariah Butts

2023-12-01 20:03:36 UTC

My strengths include designing game-type activities that promote collaboration and encouraging students to come up to the board to draw their answers. I love creating Jeopardy games and things like that where student groups are competing against each other - the element of competition always gets students working together more than when there is no competition aspect! I also utilize the white board in the classroom a lot by having students work together in groups to solve practice problems and then coming up to the board to solve the problems for their classmates to see.

In terms of areas of growth, I think that I could definitely improve a lot with collaboration. I could grow by being less suggestive about collaboration - I often catch myself saying things like "Work together if you want to", when I should be more firm by requiring students to work in groups. Also, I could improve by making sure that the quieter students are also getting involved and accountable by calling on quieter students to answer questions.

Strengths and Weaknesses

2023-12-02 00:12:15 UTC

Two strengths that I had were being very personable and allowing the students to get to know each other. This lead to more cooperation.

Two weaknesses I had were sometime the students would get distracted and spake time they didn’t want to come up to the board to answer questions. There is room for growth on these two areas.

Evan

2023-12-08 04:30:55 UTC

Strengths

I implemented group activities

I warmed up the crowd so they were willing to participate

Weakness

I gave the answers up too easily, I should have redirected questions more

I also would get distracted and go off topic and review material that the rest of the class might not have needed

Inocencio Ruiz

2023-12-08 14:51:25 UTC

Two strengths I have is my patience and understanding of where anyone is in their confusion. It usually leads to them recognizing where the solution went wrong.

Two areas of growth I believe I need to work on is my level of organization and initiation. Sometimes I don’t approach a student when I can see them struggling.

Wisdom Tonge

2024-02-22 05:13:11 UTC

Strengths: keeping the space positive and safe for them to feel like they can make a mistake without being judged for it. Convincing them that trying out a problem is not a bad thing because at least they are thinking and can eliminate that way that they though of. (This increase critical thinking)

Growth: convincing them that they should participate and how it would benefit them. Challenging them with the problems that I do.

Sarah S

2024-03-01 02:36:26 UTC

Two things I think are my strengths are collaboration, getting students to work together and talk and also being adaptive to how people understand information. I tend to have smaller amount of participant when I have sessions and I know we usually want to increase that number, but I think I can use that in my advantage sometimes to connect with students more as well as call them out to reply what they think and more. I also am able to think of examples that can help student understand terms and materials. I always try to use many examples and check for understanding. I think I am good at that because I really understand the material and I can apply it in so many ways for the students to understand. I think two weaknesses would be wait times and maybe not using different collaboration skills. I think sometimes it’s hard to wait for someone to respond so I tend to fill the silence, I also think it’s easier to stick to certain collaboration skills when I’m comfortable. But I need to reach out and try different things.

Ashlyn Bolduc

2024-03-29 19:36:09 UTC

Strengths:

I believe I am good at coming up with activities that are enjoyable and well as effective, and are good for collaboration—they force the students to work together.

I have worked very hard to ensure that my sessions feel like a safe space and that students know that it is safe to ask or answer a question without being judged.

Weaknesses:

I tend to have students in larger groups because that tends to be how numbers work out, but I could try to make a more conscious effort to take group size into account.

I usually go around and check the work of each group individually, but I think it would be beneficial to have groups share why they got their answers and why with the whole ’class.’ Ir would make them add more accountability to their work.

David Blount

2024-03-30 05:52:51 UTC

I believe two of my strengths are being able to answer to redirect questions. When a student often is confused on something or has a question regarding the problem and/or concept, I allow for other students who may understand the topic to give their input/thoughts on the matter so that it effectively promotes communication during the session.

Another strength that I believe that I have is the ability to use the Guided Design; by going step by step during the problem, students may be able to understand how to work towards the solution more effectively by knowing what concepts and/or rules must be considered as well as how to apply said concepts and/or rules.

When it comes to areas of growth, I believe that one of my weaknesses that I often lack the courage to allow students to work for theirselves; I often go over some of the problems myself while not allowing the students to fully solve it for themselves which may either feel unengaging to the students as they do not have the ability to work on their own and share their own answers and/or approach.

Another weakness that I have is that I can often be afraid to interrupt any conversation; although it is good for students to interact and engage with each other, sometimes they may get carried away and there can be too much discussion that can even lead to off-topic discussion. In this scenario, the best thing to do is to get everyone back on track by letting them know that we still have a session in-place and that, while also letting them know that I support the interaction, there is still a topic to focus on.

Mariely Rodriguez

marielyrodriguez0713 — 2024-04-03 03:17:15 UTC

I believe two of my strengths are wait time and redirecting questions to one another. When students have questions while solving problems I always respond with another question and I always allow them that time to think before they answer. I believe I am good at redirecting question because I always redirect their question to their peers.

My weaknesses are not giving the students an engaging question or push when they are asked to collaborate. My students still tend to be quiet when asked to collaborate so I think I can do better by giving them a conversation starter. I also can do better with redirecting question back to their notes. I always redirect questions to their peers but I think I can start to redirect their questions back to their notes.

Maci DeMott

2024-04-04 18:03:05 UTC

I think two strengths of this effort are the type of activities that the students do and doing my best in fostering an environment that is comfortable. For my sessions and activities, I try to make sure that I give the students room to come up with their own ideas in how to solve the problem. For example, when the students relearning new statistical analyses, I ask them to come up with their own psychological research scenario in which they would run a specific test. In this way, students in psychology typically already have an area of focus that they are interested in and this provides them a way to begin thinking about how they could impact their domain. Furthermore, when the psychology students are collaborating, they are able to merge varying interests in the field. One of the main things that I prioritize in my sessions are to make sure that I am creating an environment in which students feel comfortable to ask questions and learn from their mistakes. I think this could be very helpful when it comes to collaborating as it gives them a relatively low stakes environment to better their collaboration skills. I think two areas of growth that I can work on is being more direct when asking them to get into groups. Typically, students are very hesitant and it takes a little while to get the conversation going and solving the problem. I find it difficult to be stern as I am a bit shy, but I am working on it. Each session I try to be more firm and encouraging regarding working with others. Another area of strength is being more clear on what the goal of the activity is. At the beginning of the semester, I would simply give the students the group work directions and left it at that. However, I have noticed that this was not very helpful in their learning. To better myself in this area, I try to tell my students why an activity will be helpful for the class and their careers and what skills they will hopefully learn from this activity.

Eliezer Obeng-Dompreh

2024-04-11 18:44:39 UTC

2 Areas of Strength

I believe that I am able to effectively engage students in my sessions and create situations where there is full-group cooperation, whether it be going over practice problems or correcting mistakes. I always encourage the students to work with each other on questions before bringing their questions to me, often saying things like "Ask the person next to you what they think about the question so far."

2 Areas of Growth

While I do encourage collaboration between the students in my sessions, it is another situation entirely to get them to collaborate. I always set up my sessions in a way that allows the students to choose whether they want to collaborate or not to account for students that may not be comfortable collaborating with people that they do not know all that well. The problem is that most of the time, all of the students in the session prefer to work by themselves instead of collaborating. If I had to choose something that I need to grow in in this regard, it would definitely be this aspect of my sessions.

Collaboration! Faith Spratt

2024-04-23 11:38:26 UTC

In my sessions, I've implemented collaboration with small group work on the boards and with group discussion. I'd say these have worked really well because they help students get more perspective beyond their own and because having students articulate their perspective to other people helps them clarify their own understanding. These could be improved by having a way to introduce more interaction, not just limiting students to one group, but maybe rotating one or two members out of each group and assigning a new problem. I should also find more ways to make sure each individual is contributing to the solution.

Katelyn Nguyen

2024-04-28 00:16:18 UTC

2 strengths -

I feel like with most of my sessions there is an element of collaboration which helps students think more critically about the materials. I try and have the students pair up to solve questions or allow other students to explain topics to their peers. Another strength is I am typically very clear on the work that should be accomplished during the allotted time which helps the students know what to be working on together.

2 area of improvement -

I feel like students tend to pair up in the same way so maybe implementing some way that we change up the groups would be good. I’ve seen some random wheel spinners we could use to make teams or pairs. Something else notice is that they can sometimes get off topic especially if I give them too much time. I can work on keeping them on topic and also adjust how much time I am giving them to work.

Madie Houser

2024-04-28 21:30:18 UTC

I use collaboartive learning in my session frequently, I think it allows students to fet to know each other and play off their own strengths and weaknesses. When we do these type of activities, every student learns something new and benefits from it.

I think I can improve this by picking groups in the future and ensuring that no one is dominating a project or discussion.

Eliot Sanguinetti …. I often start my sessions with an integration bee… it is really fun! I also enforce(politely) group activities and study sessions. I find that if you don’t just put people together that will not work in groups.

2024-05-01 22:39:07 UTC

Sean Spencer

2024-05-02 02:05:54 UTC

I've implemented collaboration in many ways within the course. After lessons, I conduct desk critiques which I assist students with ways to complete assignments. I like to assist one student, then ask them to work with 2 more students to figure out how their questions relate to each other so they can problem solve. I also do many pin-ups where students get chances to help and critique each other's work to create critical-thinking individuals and the ability to receive and contribute constructive criticism. These are strengths because they create confidence and comfortability in the students so they do not feel alone. I believe I can improve on directing conversations when doing group work so that they stay productive. I also think I can work on creating groups so that one person isn't doing all the work.

Dorien Lee

2024-05-07 03:24:44 UTC

One strength of my implementation of collaboration techniques is the ability it has had to encourage my students to talk to each other and engage in the course work. Another strength is that it generally has helped in improving information retention with the class work. This is because the students are made to talk on a deeper level than a normal multiple choice question which helps them remember the concepts during quizzes. I could improve on ensuring the students are focused and on providing more direction. I think these are important to fix as if I don’t the students may remain stuck and lacking understanding due to not focusing or not understanding what is being asked and how to solve it.