The Benefits of Talking About Graduate Teaching

“The Debate of Socrates and Aspasia”

Before I taught my first graduate seminar, I received no mentoring about how to approach graduate teaching. To be fair, it was my very first quarter as an assistant professor, and I didn’t ask for any guidance. I remember being (a) deeply intimidated by the task, as I had been a graduate student just months earlier and didn’t feel that I knew enough to rise to the task; and (b) at something of a loss for models of how I wanted to teach a graduate course.

I th...