---
# System prepended metadata

title: 'Staff Retreat I: Fundamentals of Teaching and Inclusive Pedagogy'

---

# Staff Retreat I: Fundamentals of Teaching and Inclusive Pedagogy
### CS181
### Spring 2023
![](https://i.imgur.com/xDR9VQd.png)

## Part I: Teaching Philosophy and Teaching Practices

Often times, early in our teaching career, we operate by gut and are driven by a vague sense that "teaching feels good". We can be very successful for a long time as junior instructors in this mode. However, as we progress in our careers, and our teaching responsibilities grow more significant and complex, we need to unearth and interrogate our implicit assumptions about teaching, learning as well as assumptions about our roles and relationships with our students.

### Teaching Aesthetic and Practice
1. Think of a memorably **positive** experience you have had as a student? What was wonderful and significant about this experience? How this this experience effect your attitude towards learning or your academic choices later in your career?

   Think of a memorably **negative** experience you have had as a student? What was bad and significant about this experience? How this this experience effect your attitude towards learning or your academic choices later in your career?
   
2. What do you think constitute good teaching? What do you think you do well as a teacher and what do you think you struggle with as a teacher?

3. How do you evaluate your teaching? From whom and where do you seek feedback about your teaching?

4. What about teaching gives you pleasure or fulfillment? What's in it for **you**?

### Teaching Philosophy

1. What is the difference between a clear and consistent set of well-motivated teaching practices and a teaching philosophy? What is a teaching philosophy?

2. What is your teaching philosophy, instantiated in in the below concrete terms:
    - Starting at a higher level:
      - What is the purpose of learning? To make this more concrete: what am I trying to accomplish when I learn, how do I know that I've been successful in learning?
      - Define the act of teaching. To make this more concrete: what am I trying to accomplish when you teach, how do I know that I've succeeded in teaching?
    - Taking it down to earth:
      - What is the goal of classroom learning/teaching? What should it mean for a student to be succesful in a college? What should it mean for an instructor to be effective in a college class?
      - Where should learning and teaching take place in a college class? Why?
      - What is the role of an instructor? What is the role of a TF? How should these roles be related?
      - To what extent are the teaching staff responsible for student learning (e.g. not at all? In so far as the student is enrolled in the class? Even after the student has completed the class)? 
      - What are the factors that affect learning?
      

### Instantiation for CS181

1. Who is this clas for in terms of Harvard demographics (e.g. CS majors, history majors, undergrads, grads)?
2. What will our students do after CS181? What do our students want to do after CS181?
3. What is the point of CS181 -- what are the learning goals of CS181 and how do they service (if at all) the goals of our students?
4. How should we be teaching in order to help students meet the learning goals?
5. Do our students have different needs? Do we need to adapt our teaching to different needs? Does enforcing a common set of pre-req's unify our students learning needs?

### Situating Yourself

1. What do you think is the point of learning ML?
2. What role do you think ML should play in modern society? What do you think are the benefits and drawbacks of ML?
3. Who do you think should be creating ML technology? Who do you think should be using ML technology? Who do you think should get to decide which ML technology gets used and how?
4. What do you think are the skills/knowledge that's required for a student to be successful in CS181? What do you think are the skills/knowledge that's required for a person to meaningfully engage with ML?
5. What is your relationship with ML/CS -- how did you become interested in ML/CS, what was your exposure to ML/CS prior to college, how did you integrate ML/CS into your college career, what has been your experience so far in ML/CS?
6. How has (if at all) your own experience in ML/CS shaped your answers to questions 1-4? Do you think your answers to 1-4 could have been significantly different if your own experiences in ML/CS had been different? How?
7. Taking a step back, how has (if at all) your own experience in ML/CS shaped your definitions of learning and teaching, as well as what success in both look like?Do you think your conceptions of learning/teaching could have been significantly different if your own experiences in school had been different? How? 
8. Is it useful to reflect on your own particular set of experiences when developing your teaching philosophy & practices? If so, what aspects of your experiences should you relect on -- your classroom experiences, your culture, your up-bringing, your friend circle?