By Sepideh Alimohammadi Ph.D., PMP, E.I.T. 

Originally published by the Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (STLHE), October 19, 2022, and edited and reproduced here with permission of STLHE and Dr. Alimohammadi.

Graduate student teaching assistants (GTAs) play a significant role in teaching in higher education and introducing their discipline to undergraduate students in introductory/advanced level courses (Haque & Meadows, 2020). To fulfill their responsibilities, GTAs must possess certain skills, and a high level of confidence with those skills. The intersection of the three bodies of knowledge, including technology, pedagogy and content, is a requirement of effective teaching known as TPACK (Mishra, 2019). While the content and pedagogy answer the questions of “what” and “who” will be selected to pass the knowledge over to students, technology answers the question of “how” to do it in a more effective and learner-friendly way.  

GTAs' instructional duties differ across institutions and departments, including a comprehensive responsibility for designing and implementing courses, conducting tutorials, supervising discussion and laboratory groups, and marking.  In addition, GTAs are the intermediary between instructors and students, providing undeniable support and service to both parties. For instance, GTAs offer personalized learning situations in large lectures and are the primary point of contact for students (Nasser-Abu Alhija & Fresko, 2019). 

Without adequate GTA training that addresses the three elements of effective teaching noted above—notably, technology, pedagogy and content—graduate students commonly feel unprepared for their teaching experience. Feelings of anxiety may be caused by lack of confidence and lack of support/guidance from faculty, mentors and departments (Smollin & Arluke, 2014; Jungels et al., 2014). Hence, considering the undeniable role of GTAs and the importance of their contribution toward higher education, training programs to increase intrinsic motivation, educate and challenge graduate students to be creative and reflective, and equip them with the skills and knowledge used in the position are essential (Hoessler & Godden, 2015).

Training Gaps and COVID-19's Long Tail

The COVID-19 pandemic aggravated the training gap even further. During this time, many Memorial courses were delivered remotely for the first time; post-pandemic, some are still delivered online or with an online component. In this situation, the knowledge required to teach using a learning management system (LMS) has become vital. Many GTAs are international students, reflecting the overall demographics of Memorial’s graduate student enrollment. While they often have extensive teaching experience in their home countries, it can be challenging to translate this experience to Canadian higher education contexts. GTAs, especially international GTAs, need training when they begin to teach at Canadian universities because they are transitioning to a new cultural and social context at the same time as some are learning to teach for the first time (Meadows et al., 2015). For example, the concept of plagiarism is understood differently in different academic cultures and checking for plagiarism in the Memorial context while grading assignments may be a new practice for international GTAs, one for which they should be trained. 

In certain instances, the formal training of future GTAs on the use of the LMS tools (in my case, the use of Brightspace) is missing from teaching development programs. That is where the idea of designing and conducting customized workshops on Brightspace tools aimed at GTAs originated.  

The knowledge of pedagogy is addressed in some programs at Memorial, including the Teaching Assistant Training Program (TATP) and the Teaching Skills Enhancement Program (TSEP). While these two programs focus on basic teaching skills for GTAs, the formal training on Brightspace/LMS was missing until recent semesters, when it was identified as a gap by trainees and subsequently included in TATP. 

Capitalizing upon the experiences of graduate students who were then working as Learning Technology Coaches at CITL, the LMS training program was designed by identifying and prioritizing the most common responsibilities GTAs held in various academic units of Memorial.  A two-hour interactive workshop was developed as a part of the existing TATP, focusing on using Brightspace assessment and communication tools.  Participants were invited to participate in specific scenario-based activities while gaining hands-on experience working in Brightspace.  Afterwards, they reflected on the outcomes of these activities with their peers and facilitators to build their understanding.  

Program feedback from participants was designed to gain a sense of the perceived impact on general instructional competence. Overall, the attendees were delighted with the quality of the training, and many students commented on how the technology training could help them increase their self-confidence as instructors.  

In conclusion, GTAs are a vital component of academia, playing an important role in establishing positive teaching and learning environments. Therefore, equipping them with the knowledge necessary to fulfill their roles is essential. From this perspective, training initiatives designed for and customized to the needs of GTAs should become an integral part of graduate student development programs. 

Dr. Sepideh Alimohammadi

Dr. Sepideh Alimohammadi (she/her/hers) is currently a research scientist with CanmetENERGY Research Centres. While completing her studies, she worked as a Learning Technology Coach (LTC) at the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning (CITL).  At Memorial, she was awarded the title “Fellow of the School of Graduate Studies” for academic excellence, participated in the Teaching Skills Enhancement Program (TSEP), and worked as both a teaching assistant and project engineer.

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