Preparing tutorial and recitation instructors: A pedagogical approach to focusing attention on content and student reasoning

Instructors in transformed educational environments face an increased demand to anticipate, engage with, and build upon student ideas in the classroom. Consequently, there is a need to augment traditional forms of preparation to accommodate the expanding role of instructors in these environments. We document a model of weekly preparation designed to engage graduate teaching assistants (TAs) and undergraduate learning assistants (LAs) in developing broader teaching skills through the weekly discussion of student difficulties. In this paper, we describe this model and present evidence of success at focusing instructor attention on student difficulties, accomplished within existing institutional structures and without adding significantly to instructor preparation time.