Academic Jungle's post on course materials got me thinking... Am I usual in how much time I spend getting ready for a class? Here's my time estimates for various components of a large (n=300) 4 unit lecture course for non-majors, with discusion section (overseeing 5 teaching assistants):
For each 80 minute lecture I spend about 5-8 hours of time fixing last year's lecture. If I am writing an entirely new lecture, it's about 12 hours. If it was a really great lecture last year and doesn't need much tweaking, just review, I'll spend 2-3 hours on it. These are very rare though. Usually, it's about 5 hours of prep.
For each exam, I spend about 6 hours writing the first draft. I then work with my graduate students to review it with a fine-tooth comb, looking for inconsistencies, unintended obfuscation, unfair content, etc. I never re-use questions from old exams, as I know that some students have access to old exams and it'd be unfair to re-use questions. I recently started posting my old exams on the course website so that all students have the same advantage. All-in-all, when the exam is finally ready, I spent about 10 hours on it. We have three of these over the course of the semester.
For paper assignments (as we require a paper in this class), it takes me about 10 hours per topic, and I usually assign 4 different topics for them to choose from. I find this to be incredibly challenging, as I want it to relate to something going on in the world at-large, but it has to conform to the scientific style of my discipline, and they have to use primary literature. I provide them with the research articles to cite, and a bunch of context info (i.e., news paper articles, etc.) I really like the pedagogical value of the exercise, and the students generally all really, really do too. But it is a serious, serious time suck. I have found that graduate students really can't write these, as they just don't have enough experience yet. It takes me four times longer to mentor one of them through it than for me to just do it by myself with critique from them once I've got it drafted.
For discussion sections, I do have the teaching assistants work together to develop this content. I give them the main pedagogical goals for the week and some ideas. Then one of them is responsible for designing the details. We all then spend about 4 hours in meetings working through the details, critiquing, improving, etc.
This class takes up about 30 hours or so a week of my time when it is running. It is my main teaching effort, and the semester in which I teach it (i.e., right now), is really stressful for me.
I find it hard to cut-back, as I really do have a ridiculous sense of pride in my teaching. I know it doesn't count for much at all in my promotions. My university is one of those lip-service places when it comes to teaching. But I really don't understand how some faculty get up and make an ass of themselves in front of class on a regular basis so that they can get more research done. I have more pride than that.
Some days I wish I didn't. It would make my life easier if I didn't care.
What about you?
For each 80 minute lecture I spend about 5-8 hours of time fixing last year's lecture. If I am writing an entirely new lecture, it's about 12 hours. If it was a really great lecture last year and doesn't need much tweaking, just review, I'll spend 2-3 hours on it. These are very rare though. Usually, it's about 5 hours of prep.
For each exam, I spend about 6 hours writing the first draft. I then work with my graduate students to review it with a fine-tooth comb, looking for inconsistencies, unintended obfuscation, unfair content, etc. I never re-use questions from old exams, as I know that some students have access to old exams and it'd be unfair to re-use questions. I recently started posting my old exams on the course website so that all students have the same advantage. All-in-all, when the exam is finally ready, I spent about 10 hours on it. We have three of these over the course of the semester.
For paper assignments (as we require a paper in this class), it takes me about 10 hours per topic, and I usually assign 4 different topics for them to choose from. I find this to be incredibly challenging, as I want it to relate to something going on in the world at-large, but it has to conform to the scientific style of my discipline, and they have to use primary literature. I provide them with the research articles to cite, and a bunch of context info (i.e., news paper articles, etc.) I really like the pedagogical value of the exercise, and the students generally all really, really do too. But it is a serious, serious time suck. I have found that graduate students really can't write these, as they just don't have enough experience yet. It takes me four times longer to mentor one of them through it than for me to just do it by myself with critique from them once I've got it drafted.
For discussion sections, I do have the teaching assistants work together to develop this content. I give them the main pedagogical goals for the week and some ideas. Then one of them is responsible for designing the details. We all then spend about 4 hours in meetings working through the details, critiquing, improving, etc.
This class takes up about 30 hours or so a week of my time when it is running. It is my main teaching effort, and the semester in which I teach it (i.e., right now), is really stressful for me.
I find it hard to cut-back, as I really do have a ridiculous sense of pride in my teaching. I know it doesn't count for much at all in my promotions. My university is one of those lip-service places when it comes to teaching. But I really don't understand how some faculty get up and make an ass of themselves in front of class on a regular basis so that they can get more research done. I have more pride than that.
Some days I wish I didn't. It would make my life easier if I didn't care.
What about you?
Good to get this post-- I spent 5 hours on Friday revising a lecture I'd already given, and wound up still not 100% happy with it. I'd probably put in another hour or 2 if I had to give it again soon. I was feeling really slow! But you're an experienced lecturer, so this validates my effort! :)
ReplyDeleteI suspect this has a lot to do with field and approach.
ReplyDeleteI'm in the humanities. I lecture rarely. Most of my classes are writing-centered and discussion based, which minimizes prep (although in literature courses just reading the novel I'm talking about can take many hours!)
I have truly found that the amount of time I put in has NO bearing on my teaching evaluations, which are above average for my department. Like moments my personal life is an absolute mess--see 2010-2011!--my students seem the happiest with what's happening.
More time does not necessarily = better after a point.
Ouch, I spend nowhere near that time on lecture prep. Maybe the first year I was teaching I did. It takes far less than even an hour for me to re-prep a lecture I've already given.
ReplyDeleteAlso for assignments I make them do much more of the work. Being able to find appropriate citations is important! They love finding their own news articles.
My students are very well prepared for their next classes, which is my measure of how well I'm doing as a teacher. I also get high evals.
Yowzers, that's a lot of prep--certainly more than I do! I have found that after a couple hours the return is marginal (in other words, for the amount of time I put in it doesn't make my slides remarkably better).
ReplyDeleteI do spend a lot of time on exams, though. Maybe not quite ten hours (I try to write it as I go) but it is difficult and time consuming to write a good exam.
(by the way, none if this is a criticism just a "we're all different" kind of comment. I never really thought about comparing myself to anyone else)
I am teaching a new course this year. It's an undergrad course with a set syllabus and text, so that confines things a bit, plus being undergrad the material is easy-peasy, the challenge is in finding the appropriate way to convey it.
ReplyDeleteBut I would say these are the numbers per week for that one new undergrad class:
3 hours in the classroom (3x50 min);
3-4 hours prep (about 1-1.5 hrs per class)
5-6 hours writing course lecture notes, problem sets, and problem set solutions ( I assign a lot of homework)
1.5-2 hours exam prep (1 midterm every 4 weeks, takes about 6-8 hours to make from scratch to final version)
3 hours office hours (have had a full office throughout this semester)
So that's 15.5-18 hrs on that one course per week...