TEACHING STATEMENT

Marko Budiˇsi´c

No course in mathematics will make a complete novice into a master. Instead of aimingfor such an unreachable goal, I believe an eﬀective teacher will transfer to his or her studentsthree things: conﬁdence that they

can

become masters of the topic, basic tools useful tobegin understanding the topic, and an “annotated” overview of the topic, so the studentshave a sense of where to go next.Mathematics courses can be daunting to some students. To alleviate this, I try to dispelthe image of mathematics as a mystical and arcane discipline, accessible only to the naturalgeniuses. In my opinion, the confidence in mathematics is transferred both by teaching andby attitude and behavior of the teacher. Discussing problems, proofs and examples withstudents, and allowing for their mistakes, rather than immediately presenting the polishedproofs is more likely to keep students engaged. It also makes students more comfortable insharing their thoughts, even if they are wrong, which allows the teacher to gauge students’understanding and adapt the instruction to the students. I base this opinion not only on myown experience, but also on teaching style of one of my most memorable math teachers, C.Akemann. To this day, I feel I have never worked so hard at mathematics, and never madesuch a large progress in such a short time span, like I did in Chuck’s real analysis class, andthis opinion is shared by many of his students.What I called “tools” in the first paragraph is the main course content. In most of the applied mathematics courses I had experience with, the content can be roughly splitinto conceptual knowledge, techniques, and computational skill, all of which contribute tounderstanding of the material. As an example, the Control Systems Design course I wasassisting with required understanding of all three facets of the Laplace transform, whichplays a central role in analysis of linear dynamical systems.Conceptually, it was important to appeal to students’ understanding of the Fourier trans-form, and introduce the Laplace transform as its extension, even if it could be presentedindependently. From the technique standpoint, the instructor insisted on manual computa-tions of basic transforms. Initially, some students did not understand why they were asked todo such a task, when computational tools, like Matlab, can do the same. Even if that is thecase, the process of learning a technique often has favorable side-effects, turning attentionto pathologies in technique’s context, and reinforcing conceptual understanding. Finally, theuse of computational tools is not only of practical value, but it serves as a sand box, wherethe students’ intuition can be expanded, or challenged. For example, the Gibbs phenomenoncan very effectively be demonstrated computationally, challenging “more is better” adageabout approximations of functions.If a teacher should ever aim to impress the students, it should not be with his or herabilities, but rather with the topic itself. Demonstrating only technical skill, with no enthusi-asm for the topic, makes studying for the course seem like a frustrating self-serving exercise.Providing context and broader picture often throughout the course, not only in the first andthe last lecture, gives purpose to difficult parts that might otherwise turn students off anddisengage them from the material.Unfortunately, as teachers, we will never reach absolutely everybody and one must noticewhen a larger numbers of students starts lagging behind. As a teaching assistant, in such