Superficial Intelligence

Today was a very interesting day for me. The instructor for the class that I am a T.A. (Teaching Assistant) for is out of town this week and left me in charge of giving the class lectures. I have spoken to large groups of people many times before, but actually giving a college lecture is still quite a different experience.

I had no problem with the material, since it is an area that I know well and really enjoy. The class is called "Introduction to Internet Programming" and today we were discussing basic Javascript, which I am using for my HCI class project. I had no problem with the class size either. Less than 15 students attended. I even did ok with timing too. I managed to produce almost 40 minutes of lecture time (it is a 50-minute class).

In fact, the students may have not even noticed anything wrong with the class. But for me, it just felt weird. The reason for this is because I still don't feel that I belong at the other side of the podium. I still see myself too much as a student. I sometimes even forget that I am already an engineer! (That's the problem with going straight to graduate school.) What I need to do is internalize the fact that I am an engineer, that I am a professional in my field already. Only then will I feel that I am qualified to be on the other side of the podium.

I have two more classes to go, so I hope that by the end of the week my mindset has changed! It wouldn't hurt if the students actually learn something too.