The organizers of Teacher's Club (TC) are once again preparing interesting topics for lectures and workshops for the upcoming summer semester. These will include testing students in the age of artificial intelligence, a discussion on disciplinary rules, and discussions with prominent educational figures. As part of Teacher's Club, those interested can also attend online lectures offered by EuroTeQ. Those interested can find out about upcoming lectures on the Teacher's Club website, in the CTU events calendar, or through the TC newsletter.
Improving teaching skills
“The Teacher’s Club really contributes to improving the teaching skills of its members. Recently, for example, I was pleased that a colleague from the TC, who had the opportunity to design the content of part of a course, approached it very systematically and began by setting learning outcomes, from which he derived the entire content,” said Dr. Petr Pošík from the Department of Cybernetics at FEL CTU.
From his perspective as a long-time teacher, the main benefit of TC is that teachers get together, exchange experiences, and inspire each other. “Perhaps we all subconsciously long for someone to show us the one best way to teach. I think the discussions within TC contribute well to our realization that no such thing exists. There are many different paths, and it is largely up to each of us to choose the ones that best suit our personality, our subject, and our students," added Dr. Pošík.
Anyone can attend Teacher's Club meetings. The discussions tend to be rather intimate. “Around 12 people regularly attend, ranging from doctoral students to professors. There is greater interest among teachers from the FEL departments at Karlovo náměstí,” said Martin Zoula, a doctoral student at the Department of Cybernetics at FEL CTU, who co-organizes the TC.
For example, doctoral student Jiří Němeček from the Department of Computers at FEL CTU was interested in the December lecture by RNDr. Marek Genyk-Berezovský at the Teacher's Club. "Overall, I learned that if a teacher wants to have a good course, they don't have to make it simple, but they have to put a significant amount of time into it. And ideally, they should practice small but important accommodating elements, such as giving students time after the exam until midnight to correct a small error in the implementation of an algorithm that had a disproportionately large impact on the efficiency of the code," said Němeček. He also recalled an interesting fact from the lecture, namely that the lecturer had spent years creating the tasks.
Valuable advice for beginning teachers
Teacher's Club was founded in 2024 by active doctoral students in collaboration with department heads and vice deans. Doctoral students, who also teach as part of their studies, called for didactic training. The Department of Cybernetics therefore conducted a questionnaire survey among staff and doctoral students about what would help them most to improve the quality of teaching.
"A large proportion of the responses mentioned the lack of pedagogical training for beginning teachers, the lack of a summary of procedures and recommendations on what works and what does not work in teaching technical subjects, and the lack of a platform for the exchange of experiences between FEL teachers," said Dr. Petr Pošík from the Department of Cybernetics at FEL CTU at the time, adding that the Teacher's Club was created in response to these suggestions.
In addition to drawing inspiration from their colleagues, interested parties can also participate in seminars organized by partner universities within EuroTeQ, the European Society for Engineering Education, or the European University Association.
