---

tags: workshop
title: Exercise leader hackmd May '21

---

# FEEDBACK after the workshop

* How did it go in your breakoutroom?
* Anything that went particularly well?
* Anything that did not work at all?
* Any exercises that need instruction improvements?
* You can answer here or also directly add an issue to the lesson repository on our github account https://github.com/coderefinery
* Anything else you would like us to know?

# Exercise leader hackmd May '21

Dear Exercise leader,

You have made it here, awesome!
Thank you for attending the exercise leader onboarding session. Hope you will enjoy the workshop :)

> We just recently renamed the exercise leader position; before we used to call you 'helpers', some may forget about this renaming in between, but yes, also with helpers, we mean you.

## Onboarding times

* May 5 (Wednesday) 12:00-13:00 CET
* May 6 (Thursday) 12:00-13:00 CET

[Onboarding material](https://hackmd.io/@coderefinery/exerciseleaderonboarding)

## Important links

[Schedule](https://coderefinery.github.io/2021-05-10-workshop/#schedule) with link to lesson material and exercises
[Planned exercises](https://hackmd.io/@coderefinery/CR_May21_Exercises) for the workshop

## Update your availability

Please use "Manage registration" in email to keep your availability during the workshop up to date to make planning easier for us.

## Icebreaker

What motivated you to become an exercise leader?
* I want to get my research colleagues and team trained up in CodeRefinery skills
* PH: I want to share and improve my knowledge on collaborative workflows and reproducible science.
* MK: I want to learn more about the content, and about facilitating remote learning; I want more people contributing to open science and open source research software, and I'm happy to help with building capacity for that 😸
* OA: The community and the all experience during the workshop
* LF: heard about coderefinery/carpentries by chance and as I code a lot for work and open source culture is important to me, I thought this was an exciting opportunity
* MF: I needed to introduce students anyway, so coderefinery offers a pre-configured course and organization that simplifyies my life
* AJ: I enjoy helping others learn and want to help people enjoy working with code :+1:

How can we motivate people to become an exercise leader?
* Convince them that they don't need to be experts, and that enthusiasm is key! :+1:
* PH: It is a fun and social way to improve both your own and others skills. :+1:
* LF: More advertisement/visibility, e.g. if some members teach or work in computing oriented environments, they could advertise coderefinery to their colleagues/students and try recruiting exercise leaders from there.
* OA: learning by doing, helping others
*

## Questions

* you can ask any questions regarding being an exercise leader here
* and we will answer like this
* are students in BO rooms expected/likely to do the exercises on their own alone or should we encourage that one shares their screen and discuss together?
* i think it is good to encourage to share screen and discuss together, some learners will prefer to work on their own but the screensharing and navigating together can be a good format
* My learners usually wanted to work alone first (sometimes one shared a screen during that but often not); and then they shared screen if a problem or to present their solution
* +1 on encouraging screen sharing during BO exercises when issues arise. It often feels like time is quite short for everyone to finish the exercise in time, especially if there is a tech issue. Screen sharing allows everyone to take part of the exercise take home message/solution.
* +1 on encouraging screen sharing also. I think it helps to increase the discussion in the BO room. So if the room feels too quiet it might be good to suggest sharing the screen.

* Are students in BO rooms the same during the whole workshop (in the limit on dropouts etc)?
* Yes, basically so, unless as you mentioned if a room gets too small.
* We are however aware that shortcomings of the fixed room as well according to the feedback we received so far. If you feel anything uncomfortable, please let us know so that we would try to coordinate as much as possible.

* Is the BO time strict? I mean, will students automatically be moved back to the main room when time is over or is it up to us to point students back to the main room when time is over?
* It depends on the progress status as well. Sometimes we extend the exercise session time but not all the time. Also, we often reopen breakout-rooms after the day's session is over to enable continuation of exercises together.

* I see in the exercise schedule that some BO exercises are marked as optional, e.g. (In BO rooms: Optional: Conflicts and rebase), what does that practically mean?
* Ah, it was written below :sweat_smile: nvm

* It is possible to paste screenshot by `ctrl+v` 

## Interested in more CodeRefinery?

Join our [chat](https://coderefinery.zulipchat.com), introduce yourself in `#new members` and get to know the community. We will post in `#announce` if exercise leaders are needed for the next workshop.