Teaching & Programming

I don’t consider myself to be a great teacher.  I’m reasonably patient, but it takes more than that to teach.  In my Intro. to Software Development class we’re learning the Java programming language.  It’s an introductory course, so we’re not diving too deep into the language.  But I am having a blast!  I love this course.  It reminds me of all the reasons I enjoy programming.

We’re working with a partner on the projects we’re doing so far.  I have some experience with various BASIC languages and a very little bit of C++.  My partner doesn’t have that background.  Therefore, I’m at an advantage to him, and the excercises come more naturally to me.  But I want my partner to learn and not simply follow along.  I can do the work without him, but instead I’m choosing to have him write most of the code; after we diagram a sort of flow-chart for our program.  This should be a more fruitful learning experience for him.  And it’s the honorable thing to do, as opposed to me just writing all the code and dragging him along for the ride.

So, I’m a teacher.  And that puts me in a position of learning how  to better teach.  I have been attempting a technique wherein I ask more questions than I make statements.  I already know what code we could/should write.  If I ask careful questions, I find that I can encourage him to solve problems without giving up from frustration.  And, if he’s writing the code to make our work-flow work, then he should understand what it does.  It’s usually a slower process.  Indeed, I could have coded our last program in 10 minutes tops, instead of the hours it took to perfect.  But it was worth the time, because I helped make learning happen.