My Experience Working as a CS TA

Hey everyone, it’s been a while. I took a short break for finals, but I am back to blog posting now. :)

I worked as Mr. Sanchez’s TA for his Computer Science Principles class. The question coming out of it as I graduate is what I experienced, and what I took away from it.

What is a TA?

A Teacher’s Assistant (T.A.) is a student who is aiding the teacher in a range of different tasks. Some teachers have their T.A.s grade papers, while others file them. The band director had the T.A.s manage the google classroom and help teach students, and the AP Lang TA has them do almost everything except teach (from what I’ve heard). Depending on the field you’re going into, it can be really helpful to work as a T.A. for a teacher.

For example, it helps your own skills and understanding of a subject to teach others that subject, which is why they are often tutors or guides.

The Experiences

After I got approved to become his TA, I would ask him each class what I could help with, which ended up being a range of different tasks.

Researching topics and getting him materials

Oftentimes he would want me to research something, and then return some type of product to him. Here are a few examples.

1. Python Code Loop
   
   He asked me to write a python recursion loop (which is something the students need to do for the AP Exam) to teach them what it is. So, I wrote a beginner friendly loop with comments somewhat explaining what I was doing. I uploaded it to replit (now deleted because of their new policies) and emailed it to him as well.
   
   

2. Giraffe Academy Code Snippets
   
   He had me take the code snippets from a giraffe academy course and make an answer keep for the students. I re-color coded it and emailed back to him an 18 page doc. As interesting as it is, I’d reccomend just going though the course on your own time. :)

3. CyberPatriot
   
   At one point he wanted to make a team or club to participate in the U.S. cyberpatriot activites.
   
   
   
   Although the event itself never came to fruition, it was good to research and learn about.

4. Interactive Spoofing Lesson
   
   Mr. Sanchez wanted to provide an interactive spoofing lesson to hs students.
   
   

5. Atari Games
   
   One day, when I asked if he needed help, Mr. Sanchez asked me for unblocked games. I was a little confused first, but maybe he wanted to block those from the students. When I asked for clarification, he said he wanted the students to build an atari game, but discovered many of them hadn’t ever played nor heard of an atari game. And so, I found some on replit for his students to try and learn from.
   
   

6. IoT Weaknesses
   
   Mr. Sanchez wanted to teach the students about the weaknesses of Internet of Things (IoT) devices in a short and simple manner. I did some research and sent him some resources.
   
   

7. TryHackMe
   
   Mr. Sanchez wanted to contact TryHackMe and wanted a list of different contact methods.
   
   

8. CLARK Website
   
   He sent he a website link and asked me to go through and rate each link. Although some may be brutal and informal, it got the point across.
   
   

9. Usage of ChatGPT (General)
   
   Generally, he’ll give me directions for his assignment and have me input them into ChatGPT, so he knows what it’ll look like if a student cheats.
   
   Occasionally, he gave me a prompt, had AI write about it/explain it, and then had me summarize it in a shorter format for him. Ex: ““What is important about the California State Plan for Career Technical Education and how does this impact me as a teacher,” “Marzano’s Nine Essential Instructional Strategies, Blooms Taxonomy, Career Technical Student Organizations (CTSOs), Why are these 3 topics important to teachers and how can they help teachers become more effective at teaching?”

10. Abuse Report Website
    
    For his cybersecurity class, he had me research how to anonymously submit an abuse report form, and print copies for students.

11. Making his Website
    
    Surprise! I already wrote a blog post on this. Go read it here.

12. Helping Students with Code
    
    Throughout the year, I would also look over and aid students in making their apps. I would have them summarize the function of the code I’m looking at, and then try to re-work with them a different approach to the code since oftentimes it wasn’t the most efficient nor optimized. Of course, there were simple syntax issues, but usually they figured that out before they needed my hands on it.

13. Archiving the Classes on a macbook
    
    I had to archive all of the old classwork into folders onto a hard drive. I used text edit for the directions, and just downloaded the files. I went in chronological order so when he uses it again next year, he’ll know the original order the course was in. I practiced using different shortcuts than that on a Dell Laptop or school Chromebook.

Final Thoughts

It was such a pleasure to work this role, and I am grateful for the experience working with and helping people with this everchanging field of computer science.