Teaching Philosophies

Teaching Philosophies - 002

Teaching Philosophy

From the students’ point of view, teaching actually plays an important role in how we learn different knowledge. The quality of teaching greatly influences the learning effect. A good instructor should be able to lecture the course in an easy way to be understood even though the topic is difficult, and also be able to attract students’ attention. For example, many people think that engineering courses are difficult; however, if the lecturer can use some techniques and creativity in the teaching, students are more likely to focus on learning instead of sleeping during the class. Here are some strategies that I think would be useful in the teaching.

First of all, when the speakers lecture the course, we should try to be smiling and friendly all the time. This would give students a good impression that the speaker is friendly, is a nice person, and students would be willing to learn and ask questions. According to my previous experience, the popular teachers or professors tend to see their friends rather than students. As a result, when they teach the class, students would just listen to their friends and feel free to discuss the topic with the whole class. Definitely, they can learn as much as possible.

As a chemical engineering major student, sometimes it is difficult for me to truly understand some abstract concepts or engineering techniques, and I believe many students have the same problem. In order to make students completely understand the difficult topic, I would use pictures, figures, stories, videos, and examples that relate to our daily life to help them learn, if I were the lecturer. For example, when it comes to the chemical plant, sometimes student cannot understand how it looks like or how it functions. At this time, lectures can use slides, pictures, or videos to make students visualize it. In this way, they can easily envision those concepts and learn more quickly In addition, when it comes to the difficult topic, lectures had better be at a slow pace, teach from the easy part to the difficult one, and make sure everyone in the class understands it so that on one hand lecturers do not need to spend too much time on the same materials, and on the other hand students are able to learn effectively.

Last but not least, doing a project is a good motivation for students to learn. Here is what I would do. I would divide my students into several groups and ask them to find a topic which they like and which is also related to the course. In the end they will do presentations in the class. The purpose of doing a project is that students can read, study, and learn the topics they are interested in, which means that they can learn more in-depth knowledge. Besides, a presentation helps them improve their communicative skill. In the meantime, from other groups, they can also acquire knowledge about other topics. The outcomes of doing a project would be remarkable for students.

To sum up, to be a good teacher, we have to be friendly and patient to students, use some tools such as videos or pictures to inspire their interests and curiosities, and be passionate in teaching which is the most important thing. Teaching is like learning; when I teach someone, I have to figure out the best way for him or her to learn, and this process is actually learning for me. Teaching is hard work but everyone can learn a lot. If I can make them feel interested in my lecture and they can learn something from me, I think I am a successful teacher. (ChengTa Cho)

Teaching Philosophy

I started teaching in Iran while I was working on my Master’s thesis five years ago. It had always been my plan to become a professor, and based on what I admired about my favorite professors, I knew what kind of teacher I wanted to be. In my opinion a strong and influential professor in architecture and interior design needs to master a set of teaching skills, and those are not only limited to architectural science. Teaching any major related to design and creation has specific challenges in comparison to teaching majors which only require students to gain knowledge in certain areas. Interior design is strictly interlocked with creative thinking; this certainly is expected from students after gaining knowledge of the conventional design methods. Design students need to first learn the primary techniques, gain information and finally do what they are intended to do,” create.” I believe innovation plays a critical role in creation, and I must state, teaching how to be innovative was my main interest during five years of teaching in Iran and the United States.

My teaching philosophy is to encourage students to come up with new ideas and think outside the box. Some would say innovation is not something that can be taught; in response to that, imagine a student who has drawn a rudimentary drawing so far with no creativity, and does not know how to think differently; simply if they get asked to flip their drawing and redraw the same subject with the existing line work, the result would be unique and different, and by continuing this practice they can achieve something they had not originally imagined. Of course this is just one example and there are multiple ways to broaden students’ horizons and encourage them to discover new viewpoints.

In addition to teaching how to be innovative, there are other tasks that an architecture instructor should master. What is mostly required in architectural firms is flexibility and potential for group work and cooperation. In this regard, the architecture instructor should be able to do group management. Students should be divided into groups based on their strength and talent. To do this, a primary test is required in the beginning of every semester. It is necessary for students to learn how to operate in groups, respect each other’s points of view in design, cooperate and involve each other’s strength points, criticize positively, and finally divide tasks for the group’s best benefit. Group work should be rewarded in comparison to individual work and instructor should encourage students who work in groups.

Another crucial requirement for teaching is effective communication with students. Teaching is a two-way process that benefits both the students and the teachers for their experience and future reference. The final step in my teaching philosophy is incorporating students’ voice and evaluation in the established methods in class during the semester. This way I can move one step ahead at a time in order to become a better instructor. (Sahar Mihandoust)

Teaching Philosophy

Generally speaking, “Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach him to fish, he will never go hungry”; that is all about teaching. Teaching itself, personally, is a Not-So-Simple process. I couldn’t find anything more complicated and philosophical until I was assigned as a teaching assistant in Chemical Engineering department.

My major job is to show students the whole procedures of a professional experiment. This kind of experiment differs from a general chemistry experiment, because automation and specialty makes it more abstract and boring. My philosophy of teaching is to inspire my students to be fully engaged in thinking, doing and analyzing.

I believe most of undergraduates lose their interest in professional experiments due to their abstruse fundamentals and intricate analysis. To encourage their interests, I simplify the explanation of the background to make sure that they know all the related intentions to do this experiment. Usually, I start with a formula, which appears straightforward and simple. Then I show them which parameters we need, explain why we need them, how we can approach them and how they can understand the results. A small challenge or a question is a good way to help students convert from a ‘receiver’ to a ‘participant’. I prefer to give them positive comments when students give an answer because it makes them feel awarded and motivated.

The next step is to lead them to learn every fitting applied in this process. It’s better to bring them a schematic of a section or single actual device so that students can visually observe and perceive them, such as pipes, valves and so on. The most important thing is to relate these fittings with parameters we are concerned with in the formula. For example, Elevation Head can be related to different locations of inlet pipe and outlet pipe.

If students grasp the whole procedure and understand all concerned parameters within an experiment, I believe they will desire to find out what’s going on with this system as well as what the results of it are. Thus, the third step is to stand along with students, keep the system running, and give logical explanations for issues addressed during the operation. I like to share my personal experience from when I was doing this experiment to students; it can help them avoid some general mistakes. Being patient when facing their questions is also important, although some of them are simple.

In the end, my philosophy of teaching is to inspire my students to be fully engaged in thinking, doing and analyzing. (Tianyu Chen)

Teaching Philosophy

Bill Owens said, “True leadership lies in guiding others to success. In ensuring that everyone is performing at their best, doing the work they are pledged to do and doing it well.” It may sound strange for a moment but the fundamentals of managing corporations and teaching classes are the same. The key to success in both areas is primarily strong leadership. The vision for having every single quarter profitable is not very different from having every cohort passing with flying colors. Strong leaders have a strategic plan and belief that their ideas can achieve great results. They have trust in their team that all small targets can be achieved in order to fulfil the bigger dream. Similarly, an effective teacher also has a well laid out representation of his course and more importantly the students should know that their coach believes in them.

As the board of director of Community Services, Rotaract Club of Sindri (Dist. 3250), I got an opportunity to organize summer camps and crash courses for underprivileged students of my college town. This was my first experience with teaching. It was a very unusual cohort because majority of the students were lacking confidence and were not eager to learn. I took it as a challenge and planned their goals purposefully. My real test was to give each student a meaningful goal and make them realize every time that it’s achievable. From the objective I defined for each one, I started planning backwards to create an efficient learning path. Months later, we came to know through local newspapers that nearly ninety percent of our cohort had passed their tenth grade exams. That journey still warms my heart.

At my workplace we take 3D printing orders for clients, doctors, professors and other medical students. 3D printing is an entire area of research which involves digital model computer control printing of three dimensional objects. For a new recruit it can sound scary and look complicated. As a student assistant, I have an additional role of training the new recruits. The first thing I do is to instill belief in them that however complex it looks it can be done with basic steps involving parameter control.

Apart from good communication skills, an effective teacher needs to have great organizational skills too. For instance, I took a summer course on Programming Principles (II) in the Computer Science department at Texas Tech University for which the instructor was Cong Pu, a PhD student. Although, he was not a fluent speaker of English (which is understandable as English is not his native language), all his concepts were easily grasped by the students from day one. To corroborate his remarkable presentation skills, he used real-time applications and powerful slides which would convey all his thoughts clearly. Another thing which is crucial is how you design the course. Mr. Cong had constructed the course map in such a way that each class in a way contributed to the final grade and our class participation was the highlight.

Lastly, my beliefs about teaching and learning are that the trainer should himself be willing to learn not just from the outside sources but from his students too. He ought to be passionate and enthusiastic about his role and should encourage students not only to think but allow them to make mistakes too. Given any opportunity for teaching I would try to live up to those high standards. (Abhishek Kumar)

Teaching Philosophy

My major is geology, and my dream is to become a professor teaching a generation in the future. So here, I want to talk about some strategies to teach geology students successfully.

First I will try to encourage student to love their major. I will not throw a great number of concepts and terminology at the very beginning of class. It is very torturous to the students, and once they find it is really hard to capture, they tend to lose interest. Instead, I will inspire their passion in the beginning. This can be tried by showing how exciting and how interesting geology is. It can be beautiful to study White Sand, it can be spectacular to walk Great Canyon, it can be thrilling to observe a volcanic eruption in Hawaii, and it always gives you a reason to feel enthusiastic. Also, I will share the stories of great geologists as a second way of inspiration. Great scientists are always good models to follow. Giving stories of great scientists who developed from greenhorns to expert will give the students the feeling that these scientists are not high up in legend, they are actually the people we can become one day. Also the ways these scientists handle challenges and their attitude to their career could help students to be more serious with their major. After their interest is inspired, I will teach them geological knowledge with figures and photos to help visualize concepts and terminology and make them easy for students to understand. Also, field trip is another great opportunity to help students enhance their understanding.

Secondly, I will guide students to do scientific projects. Of course, learning the basic knowledge of the subject is very important. But many of you may have the impression of forgetting most of it after the final exam. That is because it is hard to really memorize knowledge if you just negatively receive the knowledge by taking notes in the class. Even you memorize it, if you do not know how to use it, this knowledge is just facts in the book. A project can provide more comprehensive training. Students will learn how a project is formalized and what things need to be considered. This will teach them the scientific way of thinking. Also, in project, students are required to digest what they learn in classes and apply this knowledge to solve problems, which is a positive way to master knowledge compared to exams. When they realize the power of the knowledge they learn, they are more encouraged to take in more knowledge. What’s more, the project requires more knowledge the students have, which inspires them to learn by themselves from a source other than their teachers.

Thirdly, I will make them more involved in group work. Each component in a watch is useless, but when they work together in harmony, they can be powerful to measure time! Nowadays, cooperation is everywhere; work is not done by a person, but a team. Many projects focus on a variety of fields instead of one field. For example, in my geology field, projects require you to have knowledge of physics, chemistry, tectonics, computer modeling etc. It is impossible for one person to have all this knowledge; it requires a team with different backgrounds. I will allow my students to have this group work experience, which trains them not only to collaborate with their knowledge, but also to conciliate their personalities. They will learn how to be leaders and how to be team members to make a group functional.

In the end, my teaching philosophy is to encourage students to be passionate with their major, know how to work independently in their own field and then to work as a member in a group. (Rui Liu)

Teaching Philosophy

As a part-time instructor in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, I have been teaching for four years. The classes that I have taught include Statistical Methods, Pre-Calculus, College Algebra, and Essential Mathematics. Teaching makes it possible to help and motivate undergraduate students and allows me to share the beauty of mathematics and statistics; in addition, teaching sharpens my teaching skills and enhances my knowledge. I love seeing students enjoy mathematics and statistics, succeed in the class, get ready for the courses in the future, and apply what they have learned in our class to their own majors and careers. I believe that my background in statistics, mathematics, computing and research help me to teach students from various fields. I am not just teaching statistics or mathematics; I am teaching students.

I learn how to teach mostly from students’ feedback in my teaching experience. In the past, students have stated that they would like more real world examples of the material in order to grasp a clear understanding. I took this feedback into consideration and worked hard to utilize a more hands-on approach that incorporated more real world examples. For instance, during the lecture about statistical measures, I took an example of five students’ ages and calculated the mean, median, and mode of this small dataset. We discussed the difference among these three measures. More importantly, I told my students why these three measures were useful, when these might and how these could be used.

Since previous students also asked for more discussion about the material, I ask students more questions which facilitate more discussion while working on examples in class. I try to remember students’ names in small classrooms and use their names when we discuss problems. In big classrooms, I walk around while giving lectures, make eye contact with my students and give them time to work on some questions by themselves or in groups. I plan to continue to ask students for feedback and implement the feedback into my teaching.

In the beginning of each class section, I review what we learned last class quickly and set small goals for that day for the students. I use online learning systems, such as WebAssign, MyMathLab, WileyPlus, and WeBWork, to assign homework. This saves a lot of time so that I can focus on designing lectures given in class, interacting with students, and coming up with practical examples and questions. I also design small-group projects where students with common interests can choose a topic, collect and analyze data using the methods learned in class, and make a presentation or write a report.

I am also participating in the TEACH program, which is a unique opportunity to criticize myself and further develop my teaching skills. The opportunity to talk with consultants who specialize in pedagogical development allows me to discuss ideas in a forum with world experts. And I am receiving invaluable feedback about teaching in the program’s workshops, which is beneficial for improving my teaching skills. In addition to attending the workshops, I am gaining much from participating in peer observations, completing curriculum design projects, and investigating new insights on possible teaching strategies. Besides that, I am working on improving teaching efficiency in mathematics and statistics and explaining concepts better through videotaped classroom observations and midterm student evaluations.

After taking my past students’ commentary into consideration, my most recent students have commented on my strengths of teaching. Some students mentioned that my classes helped them to prepare for future courses: “Really helps with the basics of Calculus.” Another set of students mentioned that I used different techniques to teach. “She explained everything clearly. She always asked if we had questions and found different ways to explain the material.” Most of their comments were about the fact that I made sure that every student understood the material: “She made sure everybody understood every topic before moving on to something else.”

In conclusion, teaching is helping learning. My teaching is characterized by interacting with diverse students, relating statistics and mathematics to their lives, helping students to set and reach their goals, and changing their lives in a positive way by making better predictions and decisions. (Yu Hua)

Teaching Philosophy

Teaching has been used by mankind from the beginning when we started communicating through verbal or nonverbal communication. Teaching is the process of passing knowledge from one generation to other generation; Failing to do so will lead to loss of the information. That is why we have libraries, so that the important knowledge can be documented and shared with the future generations. As a PhD student I got the opportunity to be a teaching assistant and teach Thermodynamics class to graduate students. With teaching I learned a few things which are very important for the teacher to share the knowledge effectively and easily. I would like to include these learnings to improve my teaching and discuss them in this article.

To teach effectively I would like to organize the material to minimize the confusion among students. Teaching material should be prepared in such a way that it should take into account the level of students. For example, if a teacher starts teaching differential equations to the freshman students without first teaching them basic calculus, then the students will have a difficult time in learning. So it is very important for the teacher to know about the level of knowledge of the students and have material prepared according to it.

Teaching and learning require a very important ingredient, which is communication. Good communication skills are imperative to express the knowledge and transfer the information from teacher to student. Two-way communication is absolutely necessary; As a teacher I am always open to questions and will help students to clarify even the trivial problems. A teacher should be an expert in the technical knowledge as well as have sound analytical ability to solve a student’s problems. My philosophy is to prepare the material one day before teaching it the next day. It gives a teacher time to think about what the possible confusions could be and questions that students will have, and a teacher can address them quickly without taking a long time in the class.

A good way of teaching is teaching the students to learn by themselves rather than always depending upon a teacher. A teacher should teach students to harbor their own skills and improve their critical thinking abilities. A good way of doing that is to give projects and homework assignments. Projects and homework challenge students to use their learning and develop their skills based on their acquired knowledge. I believe that a student’s success is a teacher's success; to implement that a teacher should design the coursework such that students’ skills are developed and students know the objective of their education.

We live in a society, and the development of society depends upon all of its members which is every individual in society. I believe teaching teamwork is very important for students, because in the future they have to work as a team to be able to improve as individuals. In group projects, when students work together they learn the importance of diverse knowledge other students bring, they learn to help each other, and they learn to effectively communicate and resolve issues together. These qualities are very important to develop among the students to and have a high impact on overall productivity. Overall I believe an effective teacher should be organized, communicate effectively, challenge students into thinking critically, be open for questions and criticisms and teach the importance of team work. (Pradeep Vyawahare)

Teaching Philosophy

In this passage, teaching philosophy could be specified as a set of practical strategies used to teach more effectively. According to this definition, teaching philosophy varies in different disciplines since all elements in the teaching process are variegated. As a student major in chemical engineering, I am able to provide my teaching philosophy based on the undergraduate level tutoring experience of chemical engineering laboratory courses. Undoubtly, the teaching philosophy would be beneficial for my future career.

Chemical engineering laboratory courses are indispensable for promoting overall understanding of chemical engineering theoretical knowledge. However, teachers still have to make students fully concentrated on these courses. Not only there are always careless students in classes, but also carelessness might cause damage to themselves or others. For me, I believe the former heartbroken reality happened around us is the vividest tutorial for students. I used several authentic disastrous examples which caused by students’ distract and carelessness to strengthen my point of view at the beginning. Then a short piece of video was displayed to show how cruel the result experimenters would get if they don’t get fully prepared before experiments or stay tightly focused during experiments. What surprised me was that all students’ faces turned serious and lots of them even asked me the best way to prepare for the later classes. Fortunately, all my students enjoyed safe chemical engineering laboratory courses at that semester.

Exercising is important in chemical engineering study, too. However, other than well-organized reports, I think that the good mastery of experimental skills also need to be emphasized. So that I selected one student per class randomly to repeat last class’s experiment briefly, which means that at least he or she has to remember and operate the several crucial steps. The mechanism ensures that all students are under the pressure of mastering experimental skills and are able to have their potential reached ultimately. Some students told me that it was an unforgettable experience and they really memorized something finally, though they felt painful at the beginning.

Although I only helped teaching for one semester, I gained a lot of experience of motivating my students and designing exercises. Moreover, I think I would be confident to face my clients in the future with the precious similar experience. (Jin Hao)

Philosophy of Teaching

Teaching is a one of the most noble professions in this world. In modern days, lots of techniques have been incorporated with pedagogy. My experience being a student, and thereafter a Teaching assistant at my previous graduate school, some ideas pertaining to teaching was developed from the experience of numerous diversified and well-experienced mentors. In my opinion, a good teacher can flourish if they are able to nurture these qualities with patience and hard work. Those philosophies will be described in the following paragraphs.

Estimable teachers should have sound knowledge over the area they will teach. Hence, not only they would be capable to visualize the matter physically, but also persuasion with great motivation will guide their pupils in multiple ways. Additionally, the teachers in the engineering field should bear more responsibility to draw good examples in correlation with the problem that the student is trying to work out. Therefore, teachers should possess great patience along with humbleness and strong personality to become a mentor and indeed a good leader. In this way, students can develop catering of thoughts and smooth implementation in real world. For example: I met a great physics mentor at my last institution whom I admired the most for his improvisation quality of exemplifying. One day in a practical session, he asked students to seat on a rotary table for teaching the concept of gyration in various positions and correlate with the physical laws of gyration. In that session, most of the students exclaimed joy learning the correlation between gyration and lifting. In this way, that great professor was able to disseminate the knowledge with fun. In my opinion, successful teachers have the quality of blending improvisation and fun with education.

Good communication skill is one of the most pertinent abilities to teaching. It includes the areas of intonation, pronunciation etc. These qualities will help teacher to talk with his students more comfortably and to share the main points of concentration more easily. Besides, adept communication involves both amiability and professionalism which means the students should treat their teacher a friendly guardian who can assist them for the subjects. However, a teacher should not maintain personal connection with the students which may bounce back to his/her personal life. Additionally, wittiness is a very good practice for the relationship between students and teachers. However, the teacher should draw a line which cannot be passed. Last but not the least, proficient teachers should be able to adapt to the advancement of technologies which can be incorporated during teaching. Hence, along with the notes on board, various e-learning resources should be introduced as pupil’s paraphernalia. It will help the students as well as the teachers to learn and improve their knowledge in diverse ways.

Furthermore, if possible, some industrial visits for the students can be arranged along with a discussion. During the discussion, sharing of ideas and views related to the visit should take place which will aid them to clear the confusions. To conclude, engineering teachers should try to develop the qualities of being a great mentor along with better adaptive qualities.(Minhaz Ur Rahman)

Teaching philosophy

As a research assistant, I believe that my teaching philosophy should be that every individual is able to learn and study what they like and what they are interested in. Just as a famous saying goes: The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.

There is a small story about myself. My father works in a power station as an engineer and he wanted me to be a power electronics engineer like him. I even worked as an intern in a power company for a month. However, I had my own plan: I was interested in control engineering. My interest in control, has developed throughout my time at school, and I enjoy the challenge of using scientific and mathematical ideas when solving everyday problems.

With this experience, I have begun to think about how to teach well, and how to help people study better than before. I will find out what they are interested in. I believe that interest is the most useful technique in studying and working. People no matter what they do, if they are interested in doing it, they must be willing to do it. Interest makes the person not fear enduring hardship; Interest makes the person consuming; Interest, and makes the person persistent and willing to put in the effort. Once people become interested in certain things, they will make every effort to engage in this matter into activity. Therefore, interest is beneficial to teach, and interest is a useful technology in a teaching philosophy.

I think that it is essential to communicate clearly to students and researchers what they are interested in. It is undoubtedly that there are some students who have no idea about what they like. I will open to new ideas and suggestions; therefore, I would like to help them to be more involved in many activities, e.g., attend educational talks, participate in conferences, to find out what they are interested in. In my view, I could also incorporate them into some practices, because participating in practices benefits from them finding the interest.

Last but not least, students and researchers should be encouraged to explore every opportunity to utilize their interests in their works. Being enthusiastic, students should pass the love of study to the actual practice, and be motivated to learn beyond the classroom. (Yiting Dong)