【Contact】
Center for Academic Practice and Resources
Mail:capr@office.hiroshima-u.ac.jp
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The students who worked as Teaching Assistants (TA) at our university are required to submit a report upon completion of their duties. The Center for Academic Practice and Resources utilises these reports by compiling and analysing them. Last year, some faculty members made inquiries about the tasks assigned to TAs and how they may differ based on their department. Hence, we conducted an investigation into the characteristics of TA responsibilities based on their respective departments using the aforementioned reports. Our analysis utilised approximately 1000 reports from Qualified Teaching Assistants (QTA). Generally, reports on their duties described in this type of document range from single-word descriptions to concise reports consisting of 3-4 sentences.
The diagram above displays a compilation of frequently used words extracted to illustrate the tasks in which students of various affiliations were involved. The words placed closer together indicate their frequent use together by the same individuals in their respective reports. Conversely, words placed further apart indicate their lower co-occurrence rate. The size of the circles represents the frequency of use. While the red squares denote the group affiliation of the students, the size of the squares corresponds to the number of students in each group who frequently used the nearby words.
Firstly, let's examine the characteristics of the report documents from student groups belonging to the departments of medicine, dentistry, and pharmacy located in the upper left. Referring to the diagram, as well as the actual report documents, it appears that their primary duties include the management and summarisation of exams and attendance records, as well as the printing and collection of materials for submission. Unlike other groups, they also seem to have a significant amount of work related to practical training. Furthermore, Teaching Assistants (TAs) belonging to the graduate schools and faculties in the fields of humanities, education, and literature located in the center of the diagram are frequently involved in supporting their instructors during classes. Upon reviewing their report documents, it was found that they are also responsible for creating and distributing teaching materials, as well as sorting out students’ comment sheets. On the other hand, TAs in fields such as advanced engineering, engineering, and information science located below tend to have duties that are characterised by their online classes, responding to questions from enrolled students, and grading and checking exercises, assignments, and tests. Finally, regarding TAs in the fields related to integrated life, biology, and advanced materials, their duties often involve explaining the reagents and instruments used in experiments. Upon reviewing their report texts, it seems that they are also responsible for explaining the methods used in these experiments. It is difficult to classify students in the Faculty of Integrated Science into specific fields, and they are excluded from the analysis in this report.
Accordingly, it appears that some unique patterns in TA work tasks can be found depending on the field to which the TA belongs. If there is an opportunity to share the points to keep in mind and the difficulties that exist in each field when engaging in these tasks, new TAs may be able to seize the opportunity to utilise them in their future TA work.