I am starting my first teaching job as a nursing instructor. I am excited and looking forward to the challenge, but at the same time I am nervous. The teaching experience I have is patient teaching in a hospital setting and teaching nursing students indivually when they are rotating through my department. What are some words of wisdom for a new instructor who has never taught in a classroom setting with students? What are some ways I can overcome some of my nervousness?

I am interested in others' experiences with dyscalculia. Is it your experience that it is stand-alone, or occurs more commonly in conjunction with dyslexia or other learning disabilities? My own experience is that dyscalculia is generally the only disability in evidence with the individual, and is generally referred to as 'Math Anxiety'. I have had limited success in making headway with it.

I am curious why some respondents consider ESL students to have a learning disability. The first sentence in the section "Defining Learning Disabilities" states"Learning disability is defined "as a disorder in one or more of the basic PSYCHOLOGICAL PROCESSES involved in understanding or using language, spoken or written, which may manifest itself in an imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write and spell, or to do mathematical calculations." If an English speaking person was living in a foreign country, learning the language and going to a career college would you label them learning disabled?

The mission statements are excellent method of not only reminding what you need to do for that day or year, it allows what your focus should be. This applies to every aspect of life and if we only can spend time establishing mission statements to our lives, all of us will achieve greater things in life!

Key terms,if you go over them in class you can add a visual of the word (pictionary)

When I was still in graduate school I had a friend who had been teaching for quite a while. We were talking about successful teaching methods and he told me the most important thing I could do to get students involved is to ask good questions. This has proven true all throughout my teaching career. Debbie K. Trantow

It is vital that we connect to the diverse types of learners that we encounter so that each of them have the opportunity to excel. This means we have to work at it. Using the tools available to us enables us to change lives every day.

I am teaching online for the first time and I am nervous about how I will do. I am confident that I know the material because I have worked in the field for 14 years but teaching it is going to be quite different. I am wondering if there are any special tips as to how to start classes and be effective without being too overpowering or seem too nervous.

My math students always tell me they are visual. I take that to mean they don't want to read the book but would rather be shown how to do a problem. Yet they don't practice on their own. I've found that making them practice in class has become very effective.

When I create objective tests, I try to incorporate several types of questions such as true/false, multiple choice, matching, and fill-in. I wonder though if I should just stick with one type per assessment or continue using many types.

I found that including language skills in math class added a positive new dimension to my lessons. For example, I asked students to write a short essay explain how to solve certain problems but without wrting out math equations. This required students to explain in writing what their thinking process is. I also do the same by asking students to verbally explain what to do to solve a problem on the board while another student performs those actions at the board. Combing writing, speaking, listening, and tactile actions has made for a more interesting math class.

When I want to encourage a shy responder to address a question, I will let him/her know a few minutes in advance that a question is coming to that student. I then prep the student on hnow to answer the question. I then call on the student to promote his/her answering a question and since the student was pre-warned of the question and the answer, he/she is well-prepared to answer. This fosters more participation in coming lessons.

I am teaching for the first time. Sometimes I feel like I am giving students too much leniency on attendance and assignments. My philosophy is that students are not there to just pass the subject but to learn. So I do not want students to feel intimidated or frightened about the subject. However, sometimes I see some of the students try to take advantage of it. What's your suggetion on that?

I have learned that I use a series of learning styles in my classroom. I try to engage the students whenever possible. I have learned a lot about the attention span of adult learners. Sometimes they seem to be the most difficult learners especially the ones that have been out of school for a long period of time.

I usually plan my courses a week ahead. The career school already has lesson plans with everything mapped out prior to the course. That makes it much easier for me to determine how I will deliver the course content. I have found out that I don't deliver the course material the same way all the time. I evaluate myself every semester and try to build on my weaknesses while maintaining the level of my strengths. I use the students feedback/exams to also evaluate my effectiveness in delivering the course material.

My subject includes both lecture and hands on. I teach Information Technology courses. I have found that this is the best method of getting the informaton out to the students. The textbooks for the projects give step-by-step instuctions to the students. I have found that most students don't like to read, but they have to in their courses. The most difficulty I find is since they don't like to read, they want the instructor to tell them what to do. Don't get caught in that trap. The students must be encouraged to read the material and perform the exercises to the best of their ability. Don't ever spoon feed adults. You will handicap them for life.

Every student has the ability to learn, teaching methods will differ but students can excel.

I move around and make eye contact well. My issue is that I have a Deep voice and that can intimidate people sometimes. I have to speak loud for people to hear. what do people do in these situations? p.s. I also tend to look intense when I am thinking.

So I implemented dividing my students into 3 groups and having each group present a topic to the class. It didn't go over as well as i thought it would. The class didn't get out of it the information they needed as well as when I present the material...I think that perhaps I need to guide the student groups more, maybe Give them an outline of specific things I'm looking for them to present? Any other ideas? I did give them each 3 questions they needed to answer, but they ended up just reading out of the book and not interpreting the information into easy to remember information.

I love to have student participation in my class, in fact I demand it... but the conquence of this is that I do recieve many off topic questions and tend to run with them more often then not .... what will help me to keep on topic?