CLAS Tutor

Introductory biology at UC Santa Barbara is taught four times a week at 8am.  For one quarter, I went to each class, not because I was enrolled, but because I was leading group tutorials for Campus Learning Assistance Services (CLAS).  CLAS helps around 7,000 students every year.  The group provides drop-in tutoring and group tutoring opportunities to help students with everything from organic chemistry to literature.  Being a group tutor for introductory biology was my introduction to teaching.  It made me realize that teaching is an iterative process.

 As a group tutor I led two discussion groups of 16-20 students each week.  I took the key concepts from the lectures taught each week and summarized them as succinctly as possible.  CLAS draws an interesting mix of students.  Often it’s enriched for the most motivated students looking for ways to increase their chances of success and students who are genuinely struggling.  Each discussion had to balance these two groups. 

As a tutor, you’re given existing material, but also given freedom to innovate.  I spent hours each week designing lessons.  I thought of different ways to explain the way DNA replicates before cells divide and the basic principles of biochemistry.  I tried to make the lessons as interactive as possible, and to allow room for the students to guide the discussion towards the concepts that confused them.  Sometimes, an approach to teaching a subject drew blank stares, and I would try again.  The experience made me realize that teaching requires adaptability.  The most important skill I learned was to recognize when students were struggling and how to change what I was doing until the subject became clearer.