Week 4

This week was probably my most successful yet.

On Monday I had 2 students come in which was less than I'd previously had, but was to be expected following a test. However after changing my office hours from Tuesday to Wednesday I had 3 people show up from 5-6. This was up from the 0 that were typically showing up on Tuesday. The Wednesday crowd seemed to be people with last minute homework problems so I tried to go over generally what was going on in the types of problems they were looking at as well as reminding them to set up equations for x and y. They all seemed to have success with the questions after they had a better understanding of the situation. The scheduled hour ran longer because they continued to have questions, but at quarter past I had to leave for my next class.

Overall I was happy with the turn out this week especially considering it was following a test and I hope to see these numbers continue to grow

John Wallace
Dr Nero
M/F 3-4

Week 3

Two students came in asking for homework help. We resolved all misconceptions and confusions together in about an hour. This session was really productive.

Week 3

Week 3 was two successful office hour sessions. Four students showed up during my first session and one student returned the next day for further assistance. We discussed homework problems and also went over vector properties.

Week 3

James Hare
Professor Broccio
Tuesday 6-7:20pm

This week no students attended my first office hour, but I did have one walk-in student later in the week, as well as one in the think-aloud time slot. I had prepared by taking some notes on the harder concepts of the videos and working the more difficult homework problems.

The student for the think-aloud hour performed the task well and outlined her thoughts effectively. However, she missed a key note in the question and was not confident of her answer. I asked her to read the question more carefully for the second part and she was much more confident that time. Overall it took less time than I had anticipated.

For my walk-in hour when one student showed up, I was able to help her understand projectile motion better conceptually and help her develop a procedure for solving problems.

Week 3

Tom Reynolds
Physics 175
Hong MWF 9:00

There were just two students this week.  They came with a few questions about the homework. They mainly just needed to understand exactly what the question was asking and once they understood that, they knew how to solve it mainly on their own.

Week 3

9/21/15
Faith Odutan
Courtney Group

9/23/15
Nobody

9/24/15
Hannah Tremel
Annie Yan
Mary Rostom
Kevin Jiang

There was a test this week so I had several visitors to my office hours. Most of the questions were from the practice test or book. One of the students had no problem with setting up the problems but always arrived at the wrong answer when she solved. It turned out her problem was that she was using the wrong direction, and thus the wrong sign on a lot of her numbers. I pointed this out and she seemed understood what was wrong. Other students had some trouble on questions with multiple parts. Some of them had trouble manipulating the equations in substituting variables or setting two equations equal.

Week of 9/21-25

I had two students come in during office hours this week to ask me a hw question. The students had difficulty understading how to apply the concepts from class to the hw problems. Once they understood the concept, they were able to get the problem. 

 

Week 3

This week the students had a test on Wednesday. Because my office hours are both on Thursday, I expected to have less students than normal attend. I only had one student come to my office hours. I helped her set up problems out of the book she was having difficulty with, and found some problems that she could do that were related to the issues she was having.

Week 3

I helped one person during each of my office hours and I conducted an interview during my session. I also met with a student today who couldn't make it to my office hours. All in all pretty effective week.

Week 3

Melanie Roberts
Professor Broccio
Tuesday 6-7:20pm

Once again, no one came to my office hours this week.  I prepared for office hours by reading the text, completing the week's homework, and watching the required video modules.  I also completed a few of the more difficult recommended problems from the text book, so that I would be prepared to explain them.

A student did sign up to attend my think-aloud hour on Tuesday.  They performed the first conceptual task more quickly than I had expected, but did not get the correct answer.  The issues the student had were more in how to tackle and understand the problem than conceptual knowledge (although that was a factor).  I gave the student suggestions on how to get relevant information out of the selected question and better approach unfamiliar figures/diagrams on the exam.  The student completed the second task more slowly and carefully and was able to come up with the correct answer.

week 4

Everything is still going at a steady pace. This week there was a total of 10 freshman that showed up to office hours. Most had questions on homework but several were far more concerned on studying for the exam and certain aspects of college grading. Its really nice to have a constant influx of students. Good luck in the future to those of you that weren't able to get anyone to show up to office hours this week.

Week 3

Bhupinder Singh Physics 1 Professor Broccio Tuesdays 6-7:20pm During this week, no one came to my office hours, however, I had a student come in and do a think aloud task. These think aloud tasks seem to be really beneficial to the students because it tests their fundamentals, and to see if they're on par with the course. Furthermore, in lecture, I helped out these two students get a basic understanding of 2D motion. That particular event felt really rewarding because they grasped the main idea of the problem due to my assistance. Hopefully, I can keep doing this every week.

Week3

Qihang Ou
M1-2 W3-4
This week we talked about forces and pulling the blocks. We prepared some questions.
In Monday, one student came and we went over the topic that will be covered in the exam. In Wednesday there was no student coming in. We had a meeting on Wednesday afternoon to talk about the plan for next week.

Week 3!

This was week 3 and the course is in full swing. I had 5 different students come to my office hours, and I had a student in my "think aloud" hour.

To prepare for my hours, I jotted down concepts I thought the students would struggle with from the videos. I also looked over the homework and completed the problems I thought were most difficult. The most common issue I encountered was about students' intuitions of velocity. At various points in an object's projectile motion, students often referred to its velocity when discussing its motion. We talked about why it's more fruitful to be specific and talk about velocity in the x or velocity in the y.

Overall, it's going well! It's really tempting just to kind of talk about the correct concept in tutoring hours, but it's better to more subtly guide the students to the correct ideas.

My think aloud hour was neat. The student did well and I had no problems with it.

Week of 9/20

I had zero students attend office hours. Next week before the test i expect a large group of students. The think aloud hour for Dr. Broccio went well on thursday.

Week 3

I had eight students in both my Tuesday and my Wednesday office hours. No student stayed for the entire hour and a half, but most students stayed for around an hour, which meant it was a little busy, but I felt more prepared, or maybe more of them wanted the same questions answered. A few just stayed in the room and did homework, and asked for clarification every once in a while, instead of having me go through an entire problem.

I feel as though it went smoothly, and several students said they'd be back next week.

Week 3

Week 3-

I was surprised I didn't have more student come in since they have a test this week. I had similar numbers to last week on Monday (This week I had 4). Two of the students were returning students which was nice. One had specific homework problems and the other had more general questions. I again had no one show up on Tuesday. I talked to Dr. Nero about it and he said it would be beneficial to move my hours to Wednesday after their recitation which is also the day their homework is due.

I hope to have more students come to me for help as I have been excited to explain these concepts.

John Wallace
Dr Nero
M/F 3-4

Week 4

This week has followed the trend of lower attendance than previous weeks. Three people attended Monday's session and two people attended on Friday.  The majority of the questions related to homework problems and previous exam problems.  On Monday, the prepared review sheet was covered completely, but there was not enough time on Friday to discuss it.  Overall, the sessions seemed to help the students that attended, and the lower attendance allows for more one-on-one assistance.

Week 3

This week I had one student come to office hours. We talked about the concepts of velocity and acceleration. She didn't have any problems that she needed help with, but rather she was struggling with the concepts and wanted to talk it out. It was cool to see the light bulb switch on in her head as she was talking about. I think it was definitely helpful to her.

Week 2

Students came in with practice exam questions on both Wednesday and Thursday.  My Wednesday office hour was not that busy, but on Thursday around 15 students came to ask about the practice test and tips for the upcoming exam.  After running through the practice test, I explained some book questions that I thought were important on the board.  A majority of the students who came this Thursday attended on Thursday of the previous week as well.  

Week 4

I had a total of 9 students attend my review sessions.  We mostly covered kinematics in two-dimensions.  After covering these topics I answered any homework problems they had.  Some students had some trouble with basic concepts such as differentiating velocity and acceleration, which seemed to slow down the progress of the entire group.  I have learned that trying to cater to students of different knowledge levels can be difficult.

Week 2 (9/22/15)

This week, I had 16 students attend my Tuesday office hours. Many students had questions about the homework, and many were also trying to prepare for their test on Friday. Because I had many students coming in at different times with the same question, I tried to have the students who already heard my explanation teach the students who still had questions about it. After this, I would clear up any confusion and make sure that both students understandings were solid. I found this to be an effective teaching style, and I'm going to try to continue doing it throughout my sessions. I also had 3-4 return students from last week, and a few students said that they would return for next week.

Week 2

During my first office hour session, a surprising 13 students showed up. It was difficult to give them individual help, so I instead focused on some common problems and did some teaching on the blackboard. Most students seemed to think that the session was very helpful. On the other hand, no students showed up to my second office hour session this week.

Week 2

Tom Reynolds
Physics 175
Hong MWF 9:00
There were 7 students at my office hours last week.  The homework that week was more difficult than the ones before it so many students had a few more students went.

Week 3

So far, there have been plenty of people showing up at my office hours, at least enough to keep me pleasantly entertained. Over the 2 days that I hold office hours, 8 different student showed up with intelligent questions on homework and concepts taught in the class. This leaves me with a very positive attitude for the rest of the semester. Good luck every one

Week 2

I had 5 students attend my office hours this week. I had 1 attend the morning session, and 4 in my afternoon session. I mainly had students ask me questions related to vector algebra, which I expected. The main troubles were with the dot and cross product. I showed some of the students the method of setting up a matrix and taking the determinate for a cross product, and the response seemed positive overall to this method. I had a few returning students which I was pleased about, hopefully my attendance continues to climb over the semester.

Week 1/2

Week 1
No students at office hours

Week 2
9/14: Courtney Group, Mike Thomas
9/15: Emily Klawon
9/17: Kevin Jiang

I had several students come in during week 2. Most of the questions were regarding the homework that they had. I just had to explain how some of the basic concepts worked for them to understand. One of the students was able to set up the problem right, but during the process of solving them, added several unnecessary steps that confused her. Another student had problems with finding the time it took for a ball thrown in air to hit the ground. He wanted find the distance the ball traveled up in the air first and then the distance it fell, but I explained that it was much easier just to find the net displacement.

Week 2

Bhupinder Singh Physics 1 Professor Broccio Tuesdays 6-7:20pm Just like last week, I didn't have anyone attend my office hours. However, in lecture, I saw some positive feedback when i was explaining displacement to students, compared to me explaining vector addition the previous week. On Tuesday, I will have my first interview with a student for the think aloud tasks, so I'm excited for that. Hope everything goes well, and I get to help some more students this upcoming week.

Week 1 (9/17/15)

I completed my first office hours on Tuesday from 12:00-3:00. I had 7 students come to see me during my office hours, including one from a different section of PHYS 0174. All of the students had questions about the homework, and I was able to help them all with their questions. I found one recurring question, which had to do with adjusting the 5 kinematics equations when an object is launched/dropped at a time other than t=0. I emailed the professor about this recurring issue, and he was able to address it in office hours. Overall, I felt that my first office hours were very successful, and I was able to adapt my explanations to each individual's learning style, so hopefully I will have a few returning students.

Week 2

Week 2

Qihang Ou

M1-2 W3-4

In Monday's session, I found the room was not available, so I took students who came to my session to another room. There were 2 students coming. We discussed some problems on homework. They finished two homework problems during my session. I gave them some hints and review on important concepts and formulas. 

In Wednesday's session, I received an email that the room is changed. So when I went to the new room, there was a class. I waited for students but no one came here. 

Qihang Ou

Week 2

So I helped one student on Friday morning with homework problems, I didn't know how to do one of the problems during the office hours but I was able to email the student the information she needed to solve the problem after I looked up some things. I actually learned some physics helping her out. I think that people will more consistently come to my Friday office hours because it is just before homework is due.

Week 2

Completed another successful week of UTA sessions.  Monday's session had 7 students and I was able to answer student questions and students helped each other on certain issues.  Friday's session had 3 in attendance (2 were returning students) and we went over the entire sheet of questions prepared by Dr. Salman's UTA's.  Overall, it was a good week and I'm anticipating somewhat of a busy day next Monday due to the exam on Wednesday.

Week 1 and 2

I didn't have any students come to my office hours for the first two weeks. The class is only about 30-40 students so I thought maybe that could be the reason. Although I haven't had the chance to tutor during my office hours, our professor has kept the UTAs very involved throughout the lectures. I have been able to help several groups of students on problems regarding displacement, velocity, and speed.

Week 3

This week I had no students attend my Tuesday office hours, but had 5 students attend my Wednesday review session.  We covered basic math concepts, vectors, and kinematics in one dimension.  Most of the students actively participated in our discussions so I spent most of my time facilitating rather than solving problems myself.  I had two students tell me the review was very helpful and would be interested in coming again next week.

Week 2

Kevin Jonovich

PHYS 0174

M/F 2-3, W 2-4

This week a total of 38 students showed up to office hours. I was not prepared for the large amounts of students, but still managed to help them with homework questions. I received an email that a student was overwhelmed by the amount of people and would like to request to meet with me for personal tutoring. The other UTA and I will alternate weeks for meeting with her.

Week 2

Melanie Roberts
Broccio 6pm Tuesday

This was technically my second week of holding office hours, since I was able to hold one last Friday after the room assignments came out.  I prepared for my Monday walk-in hour by going over homework questions, picking out sample problems from the text book, and going over the video module questions.  For my Friday walk-in hour, I also prepared sample problems based off of what students struggled with in the lecture on Tuesday.  Unfortunately, no students came to any of my walk-in hours this week.  However, I'm looking forward to the think-aloud activity next week; I believe it will help students become more conscious of the thought process involved with solving problems and will be a valuable exam preparation.

Week 1/2

Due to when room assignments came out, no one attended my office hours (Tu/W from 8:30 to 10AM) the first week. During class, the other undergraduate TA and I walk around the class while students work on clicker questions or worksheets so we can help answer questions then.

This week, I had five students on Tuesday and nine on Wednesday. Some students had questions I couldn't answer, such as turning in extra credit and class policies. Most students wanted to go over homework problems and I was able to help them, though one student brought in a supplemental question from the textbook he had found and couldn't answer, and I was not entirely prepared for it, so he decided to just ignore it and ask questions that were related to the homework as it was a better use of our time.

On Wednesday, due to the large amounts of students I had at once, I wasn't able to answer every question everyone had, so I had to email some students some hints on how to go about solving the problem. I also had a hiccup where I misread a question and answered the wrong question, which caused some confusion. But I was able to clear things up for the most part.

At one point, I had five students at once, and three completely different questions they wanted addressed. It was somewhat overwhelming, and I hope no one felt overlooked. 

Week 1

This was the first week of having office hours due to the shortened week.  On Wednesday from 4-5, I had one student come in and we worked on vectors (cross products, addition, and subtraction).  On Thursday from 3-5 I had 12 students come in.  They had a concept quiz due and I helped students out on those for most of the time.  The prevailing topic that students seemed to have the most trouble with was relative motion.  There were a few projectile motion questions as well.

Weeks 1-2

James Hare
Broccio 6pm Tuesday (flipped class)

This week was my first week holding all my office hours; only one student attended an hour, but I was able to give her help with lots of questions from the videos and homework. She mainly needed help with vectors and trigonometry, and I think I was able to help her develop those skills and enhance her ability to study for exams.

My walk-in hours are Monday 7:30-8:30pm in Benedum 230 (next to 229), and Thursday 4-5pm in Cathedral 329. I prepare for the walk-in hours by working through the homework problems from each week and reviewing the examples in the videos.

I am looking forward to the think-aloud hours starting next week, they should really be helpful to the students who sign up for them!

Week 1/2

This week (September 14th-17th) was my first week of holding office hours. I did not hold them last week because my "think-aloud" hour was going to be Thursday, and we had nothing scheduled for then.

Now, my hours are as follows: Monday 4-5, Tuesday 2-4, and Thursday 11-12. Monday and Tuesday I am in Cathedral 329, and on Thursday I am in Cathedral 319.

No one attended my office hours on Monday or Thursday.

On Tuesday I had one student attend my office hours. She had already watched the videos and had a few questions on some of the accompanying questions. Specifically, we talked about the question that asked which property is true, in general, for constant velocity. She originally selected the answer that said its motion was distinct from constant acceleration. We talked about why its motion is not actually different from the motion of an object with constant acceleration, but is instead a special case of it, where the acceleration just happens to be 0. I'd like to note that I do think this question was too ambiguous. Because, in a sense, the motion for constant velocity is distinct from constant acceleration, depending on the student's concept of motion.

While it did not come up, I prepared for the office hours by doing the homework problems that I thought students would have the most difficulty with.

Week 2

No students came in this week.

Week 1

One student came in and needed some help with concepts and how to solve kinematic problems. She spent the full two hours working in the room with me. We made a lot of progress and she said she felt a lot better after coming in.

Week 1/2

As room assignments didn't come out until the middle of the week, I was unable to announce my M/T office hours until Friday which didn't allow for people to come to them. Week 1 consisted of attending lectures and responding to students questions about the video lectures online. Week 2 was the first week I was able to hold office hours at my regularly scheduled times. There was some room confusion on both days but I wound up being able to see 4 people on Monday from 1-3 and no one came on Tuesday from 1-2. Mondays group was successful as they were eager to not only ask for my help but sought solutions from each other. I went over basic derivatives and what they mean with a few students who had no prior exposure to calculus. Students also asked about how a cross product works using matrices and using the right hand rule. I hope to have more people continue to show up as the semester progresses.

John Wallace
PHYS 0174
Nero M/F 3-4

Week 1

My room reservations did not overlap with any other person's. No students came to my office hours but I think as we get closer to exam 1 more students will find there way to me and then continue to come.

Week 1

Tom Reynolds
Physics 0175
Hong 9:00

1 student came to my office hours.  He came with a lot of questions about the material and the homework so he stayed for almost the entire hour on Friday.

Week 1

This week I was unfortunately not able to hold my regular office hours. My office was still unassigned during my first time slot. During the second time slot, the office was taken by another group. My office has been moved to another location and I should be able to hold normal office hours this coming week.

On the bright side, I did receive an e-mail from a student asking for extra help because she had missed all of the scheduled office hours. I met with her and gave her some guidance with homework problems and some general advice for physics. She has since contacted me and told me that my advice helped her a lot with the homework.

Solomon Astley
UTA for Dr. Salman, MW evening class

Week 1

This week I had three students come to my hours. All three stayed the whole time. I had one who wanted help with calculus based problems as he had not taken a calculus course yet. The other students just had simple questions about 1-d motion. All three finished the worksheet with minimal help.

Chad Foster
Dr. Salman's class 6-8pm M,W

Week 1

Bhupinder Singh Physics 1 Professor Broccio Tuesdays 6-7:20pm This week, I didn't have anyone come into my office hours, however, I helped some students during the lecture. It was quite rewarding helping students get on the right path to solve a problem. However, some were still struggling despite me doing the best I could with the allotted time, so I plan to be more clear and concise this upcoming week.

Week 1

Melanie Roberts

Phys 0110

Broccio Tues 6-7:20pm

The in-class lecture and problem solving this week went well, as many students were able to explain and perform simple vector addition and trigonometry when doing group work.  Still, a few students struggled with one of the addition problems.  To prepare for my first UTA office hours session, I prepared a list of important definitions (e.g. vector, scalar, magnitude) and selected several problems from the book to use for discussion.  I was only able to hold a Friday session of office hours this week due to the Labor Day weekend.  No students attended, most likely because the schedule for office hours had only been made available the day before.  Students will probably start to attend next week after they have checked CourseWeb, or closer to the date of the first exam.

Successful Week 1

Due to the Labor Day holiday, I only hosted one peer review study session.  CL 119 was available as scheduled, though the seating arrangements with the chalkboards weren't the most conducive to the session.  6 students attended the session and each had one or two specific questions that were addressed in the first part of the session.  The two prepared problems were reviewed with the remaining time.

First Week

Qihang Ou
Phys 0174

Salman M/F 10-11, W 10-12

On Wednesday, 2 students came in my room CL113. At the beginning, we discussed about one basic problem about kinematics. Then, i gave them a difficult problem and ask them to think about that. Then we discussed about it together. These two problems were prepared by Dr.Salman's uta group. We have a group session to prepare some questions every Wednesday. Finally, one student had a question on homework, so I gave her some hints. 

Week 1

Kevin Jonovich

Phys 0174

Devaty M/F 2-3, W 2-4

This is the first week of office hours. 5 students came in today asking for help on homework. All of the students that came in asked for help on one specific question. Because of this, I asked the professor to go over this question during lecture. He said he would mention it briefly.