What is your experience of teaching? Pat Leon asks teachers how they manage.
Name : Harriet Clarke.
Age : 32.
Job : Lecturer in psychology for social work, Institute of Applied Social Studies, University of Birmingham.
Salary : Lecturer B scale (up to £34,838) Qualifications: Psychology/sociology BA (Sheffield); PhD (Leicester); currently studying for a postgraduate certificate in learning and teaching in higher education (Birmingham).
Experience : I was a researcher at the Nuffield Community Care Studies Unit, Leicester University, from 1994 until 2001. My work focused on disabled parents' experiences of raising children and social care for older people.
I also taught small groups of medical undergraduates on subjects such as health policy.
Hours spent teaching : About 100 hours direct teaching a year, plus preparation, assessment time, placement tutoring, dissertation tutorials and so on. My teaching is cross-disciplinary. I like moving in and out of territories, but it's hard work.
Hours on red tape : Whatever I take on from meetings or as part of the team.
Admin roles will be rejigged when the social-work degree starts this year.
Hours on research : About 30 per cent of my time. When I began this job, I managed to complete my PhD and co-write a book on parenting and disability.
But the past few weeks have been focused on helping students start placements and on next year's admissions.
Teaching bugbear : Developing myself as a teacher. When I began lecturing, I grabbed every staff-development opportunity. It was useful to meet lecturing staff from different departments. It also built my skills and confidence. Now I find it hard to make the time because I am writing up research.
How do you solve it? I see it as a temporary hitch. The teaching group I work with, including my mentor, has been supportive, so I've been able to talk through my teaching with them.
Worst teaching moments? The beginning, when I was like a scared bunny caught in headlights - over-prepared and underconfident. Now I really like working with groups. Our students generally have social-care experience, but sometimes psychology topics touch raw nerves.
Least funny? Teaching a course titled "Personal understanding of health and illness" breathless and redfaced from running up nine flights of stairs as I couldn't find a parking space and was late.
Teaching tip? If you are teaching a professional qualifying course but are not a practitioner, remember what experience you have - for me it's social care research - and talk to others doing similar teaching.
Outside interests : Walking, camping, swimming and yoga.