I presented this workshop at Major League Hacking's conference, Hackcon VI, in August of 2018. These are really great tips for anyone interested in improving they way the teach technical workshops!

1. Transform Your Technical
Workshop With These Teaching
Tips!
jamie@mlh.io @SteministBarbie
By Jamie Wittenberg

2. What You're Going to Learn 🤔 about Teaching 📚
1 Introduction
2 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #1: Ice Breakers
3 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #2: Pulse Checks
4 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #3: Questioning
5 Discussion + Wrap-Up
👉

3. Hey there, I’m
Jamie Wittenberg
I’m a Product Manager for

4. & formerly

5. 1. What’s your name?
2. What organization are you representing?
3. What is the coolest thing you’ve learned
this year?
Icebreaker

7. A hacker education tool 📚

8. A hacker engagement tool ‼

9. What You're Going to Learn 🤔 about Teaching 📚
1 Introduction
2 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #1: Ice Breakers
3 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #2: Pulse Checks
4 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #3: Questioning
5 Discussion + Wrap-Up
👉

10. Use Good Icebreakers ✔

11. ✔ Good Icebreakers are:

12. 1. Opportunities for introduction 🤝

13. 2. At most 30 seconds per person. ⏱

14. 3. Relevant but not overly personal (

15. Examples of Good Icebreakers Include:

16. 1. Questions like: What’s the first thing you ever coded? 💻

17. 2. Activities like: Construct something! 🏗
Give participants 3 minutes to make a tower out of
popsicle sticks in a group and compare at the end.

18. Less Good Icebreakers Include:

19. 1. Questions like “What’s the scariest thing that ever
happened to you?” ⁉

20. 2. Activities like: trust falls. Just don’t do this. ❌

21. Activity
1. Break into groups of five.
2. Brainstorm 5 ice breakers as a group.
3. Report back your favorite one to share!

23. Let’s Share!
Designate a person from the group to share the best ice
breaker from your group.

24. What You're Going to Learn 🤔 about Teaching 📚
1 Introduction
2 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #1: Ice Breakers
3 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #2: Pulse Checks
4 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #3: Questioning
5 Discussion + Wrap-Up
👉

25. Use Effective Pulse Checks

26. Good Pulse Checks:

27. 1. Allow for a spectrum or range of responses 🎤

28. 2. And are visual in nature 👀

29. Bad Pulse Checks:

30. 1. Are binary, like: “Does everyone get it?” /

31. 2. Require a verbal response from all participants. 🤐

32. 3. “Thumbs up if you’re ready.” 👍

33. Activity
I’m going to demonstrate some pulse checks!

34. Fist To Five 👊

35. Thumbs down if you got lost on the way to this room. 👎

36. Snap if you need more time. 👌

37. Activity
1. Break into groups of five.
2. Each person in the group come up with something
with which you want to gauge the group’s comfort
level. (1 minute)
3. Ask your group, on a scale of 0-5, how comfortable
they are with that topic. (5 minutes)

40. What You're Going to Learn 🤔 about Teaching 📚
1 Introduction
2 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #1: Ice Breakers
3 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #2: Pulse Checks
4 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #3: Questioning
5 Discussion + Wrap-Up
👉

41. Turn Sentences Into Questions ❓

46. Turn and Talks 🎤
A Turn and Talk is when you pose a question to the group,
give them 1 minute to think, then 2 minutes to turn to
someone around them and discuss their answers.

47. Let’s Try It!
What was the best lesson or workshop you’ve ever
attended? What made it great?

48. Discuss
What are the advantages of a Turn and Talk versus
taking individual answers from the group?

49. Formative Assessment Questioning

50. Formative Assessment Questioning
1. Why do you think we just did that?
2. What purpose does that code serve?
3. What part of the application does this influence?
4. What’s the expected behavior of this code?

51. Activity Demonstration

52. Questions
1. Can you think of any examples
of when you would want to use
a stack?
2. How does a stack differ from
other data structures you
know?
3. When would you NOT want to
use a stack?

53. Activity
1. Visit mlhlocal.host/hackcon-workshop
2. Make a copy of the presentation in your own Google
Drive or download it and open in on your computer.
3. Add questions to the presenter’s notes that engage
your audience.

55. What You're Going to Learn 🤔 about Teaching 📚
1 Introduction
2 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #1: Ice Breakers
3 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #2: Pulse Checks
4 Jamie’s Top Teaching Tip #3: Questioning
5 Discussion + Wrap-Up
👉

56. Summary
1. Open your workshop with an icebreaker. ✔
2. Use pulse checks to keep your audience engaged. 👍
3. Ask high-quality questions to deepen learning. 🙋

57. Questions?

58. Let’s Learn by HACKING