What We Cover in Instructor Training

1. Create a concept map for a ten-minute lesson of their choosing.
2. Create some assessment questions to distinguish novices from competent practitioners, and competent practitioners from experts (again, for one small topic).
3. Make a three-minute screencast (which always takes a lot longer than people expect), and critique an existing screencast.
4. Give someone technical help online (e.g., via screen sharing), and reflect on how that mode of teaching compares to teaching live and to recorded video.
5. Work through our "driver's license" exam to demonstrate mastery of core Software Carpentry tools and concepts.
6. Teach a topic at a bootcamp and post reflections on how it went.

Participants are sometimes surprised that we spend so little time on the Software Carpentry material, and so much on general theory and practice. The reason is simple: instructors must constantly adapt to new audiences and new needs, and knowing the principles behind good teaching is a lot more useful for that than intimate familiarity with our lessons on regular expressions.

The next round of training—our seventh—will start in early October. If you would like to take part, please send us email and we'll add you to the contact list.