TA Training.md

• Introduce yourselves!

  Spend some time learning each others' names, along with everyone's backgrounds in Clojure, functional programming, and programming at large.

• Review the RailsBridge teacher training slides.

  They live at http://docs.railsbridge.org/workshop/more_teacher_training.

• Determine how TAs should approach students, taking into account the layout of your classroom.

  For example, if your classroom space is large enough to do so, it's usually preferable to seat students in clusters, which help facilitate discussion. In this case, it's best to divide the TAs, (informally) assigning them to assist a cluster or two at a time.

  However, if your classroom has tables arranged in rows facing forward, it may be preferable to have TAs seated amongst the students; having TAs along the edges of the rows will make them less approachable, and having TAs walk along the rows could block students' view of the teacher and slides.

• Choose a circus ringmistress!

  As described in the ClojureBridge docs, the circus ringmistress acts as the face of your workshop the day it takes place.

  The ringmistress should welcome everyone to your workshop with a "What are we doing here?" introduction, then help send people to the appropriate groups (if you are running a workshop with multiple beginner/intermediate/advanced groups).

  The ringmistress should also be in charge of opening issues (and submitting PRs, if possible!) for your workshop's curriculum repo as you encounter challenges throughout the day. Teachers and TAs will probably be tempted to open issues and submit PRs to the repo themselves, but it's preferable that the ringmistress handle it, instead; teachers and TAs should stay focused on helping attendees learn to code!

  Finally, throughout the day, the ringmistress should announce to the group when food is being served, breaks should be taken, etc., so that the workshop can stay on track.

• Make sure all volunteers know where the unisex and women's bathrooms are.

  In addition, if your workshop is being hosted in a space that requires a key to use the bathroom, be sure that the key is freely accessible to all attendees (preferable), or that a non-male volunteer keeps track of the key--so that women and gender minorities are not required to ask permission from men to use the bathroom.

  Also, particularly if your workshop is being hosted in a tech office, overstock the unisex and women's bathrooms if at all possible. Tech offices are typically male-dominated spaces, so unisex and women's bathrooms might not be fully stocked, by default.