content/2023/kickstart-2023-wrap-up: Blog post (very old draft)

- Draft post I found uncommitted in my working directory.  Did a bit
  of fix-up and PRing.
- Review: give it a good read and add more opinions to it.

content/2023/kickstart-2023-wrap-up.rst

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+:blogpost: true
+:date: 2023-06-08
+:author: Richard Darst
+:category: teaching
+
+
+Kickstart 2023 wrap-up and thoughts for the future
+==================================================
+
+Our `kickstart course
+<https://scicomp.aalto.fi/training/scip/kickstart-2023/>`__ came and
+went with very few problems.  This post summarizes our general
+thoughts on the course and its format.
+
+If you want to join the course next year (as an attendee, or as an
+organization who will send your learners to us (and maybe co-teach)
+`follow us on Mastodon <https://fosstodon.org/@SciCompAalto>`__.  This
+is the third year we've done the livestream format, and it's not
+likely to stop anytime soon.
+
+
+
+General feedback
+----------------
+
+Our general feedback remains quite positive.  Our streaming +
+coteaching + collaborative notes format is still well received, and
+there seems to be little reason to go back for courses of smaller
+scale.  Reading + livestream + videos is a good combination.
+
+
+
+Not enough time
+---------------
+
+There is never enough time - not much else to say.
+
+
+Reduce repetition
+-----------------
+
+Repitition is good, but not when it's a sign that we can't stop
+talking and keep saying the same thing over and over.  The best
+lessons seemed to be the ones that were taught most quickly, since it
+has a high density of new information.  We should strive to make more
+lessons faster, and leave details to the reading.
+
+
+
+Integrated support and teaching
+-------------------------------
+
+Because the teachers also do support, for anything difficult, we can
+easily tell learners: "Do what you can, come by our
+:external:ref:`SciComp garage <garage>` to ask for help with anything
+else.  This overall reduces the demands from teaching: a person
+doesn't have to know everything, but know enough to get started and to
+know when they may need more help for more advanced tools.  This
+really is good for both of us.
+
+
+Linux shell and other prerequisites
+-----------------------------------
+
+As usual, we expected our learners to read our `shell crash course
+<https://scicomp.aalto.fi/scicomp/shell/>`__ in advance.  We also had
+a new tutorial on :external:doc:`using the cluster from the shell
+</triton/tut/cluster-shell>`.  This helped some, but it was still a
+problem.
+
+Reflection: this will always be a problem in any course that has a
+wide enough audience.  We should accept and provide positive support
+for those not ready, and not try to exclude them.  It's OK to see a
+course and then strive to get the prerequisites later.
+
+
+
+Divide the course into two
+--------------------------
+
+Internally, we had this thought of dividing the course in two: a basic
+part at the start of the summer, and an advanced part at the end -
+since brand new researchers may have trouble understanding
+everything.  On the other hand, the fact we have videos means that
+people can come back and review the material when they are ready.  So
+in some sense, learners can divide the course however they would like
+by stopping when they think it's no longer necessary and coming back.
+This could be mentioned more explicitly in our introductions.
+
+
+
+Attendance
+----------
+
+Attendance goes down day-by-day.  This is definitely OK - it doesn't
+hurt anyone.  It's expected that day 1 was suitable for the most
+people (even those not doing HPC work), and then the course topics got
+continually more specific as we went further and further.
+
+As mentioned above, this is even be expected and encouraged - better
+to have someone attend day 1, than not.
+
+
+
+Exercise level
+--------------
+
+Our exercises are quite basic overall, but we got few complains about
+this.  Basic exercises are better than something too advanced or
+realistic, that requires many things to come together.
+
+This year, we tried to have a complete solution for every exercise
+(script and/or commands), even if it's directly said above in the
+lesson.  This seemed to be good, since for people very short of time,
+they still have some chance to copy and paste and do the exercises.
+For those passively following, they can at least see what would have
+been done.
+
+
+
+Other feedback from the notes
+-----------------------------
+
+Day 3 / end of course feedback positive feedback (``o`` is the way a
+person votes for/agrees with that option:
+
+- it’s great that the material is so easily accessible also after the
+  course to go through things in my own pace again oo
+- Really good format with the streaming and the shared document for
+  questions. ooooo
+- The cat kept me focused in the lecture
+- Live interaction with the instructes were very helpful and excercises were nice
+- I really appreaciate the instructors took the time to explain the
+  jargons, instead of just letting them fly around. o
+- The fact that the instructors were really nice contributed to the
+  good course experience. Thanks for that! o
+- (day 1) After studying remotely for 1,5 year and having lots of
+  online classes, I highly appreciate the amazing audio quality
+  here. Many thanks for that!
+- (day 1) The framework is better than any other workshop I’ve ever
+  attended - in terms of interaction and audio quality. HackMD is
+  great.
+- (day 1) The (twitch) vertical screen thing is genius and should be
+  used in way more (online) lectures o
+
+Most common negative feedback: not enough time! In fact, that's
+almost only thing to improve. Except we can't, so I think we win
+pretty well. And videos/material allows follow-up.
+
+
+
+See also
+--------
+- `Summer kickstart
+  <https://scicomp.aalto.fi/training/scip/kickstart-2023/>`__
+- `How we did summer kickstart 2021 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gi_zHFPgpfw&list=PLZLVmS9rf3nN1Rj-TAqFEzFM22Y1kJmvn>`__