Steven Carnahan II

Challenge your students. Challenge them to learn, grow, and ask questions. Be enthusiastic and they will be motivated about your abilities and knowledge of the subject at hand. Keep them yearning for more information, keep things fresh and different, change your techniques from time to time to accomodate the various learning styles of your students.

Never lose site of the student. They are the reason we are here and the reason we do what we do. If they go astray, we have led them there. If they are on the right path, we have led them there. If they are lost, so are we. Remember why they are here and what their purpose is and that will guide you in retaining them and keeping them focused on the job at hand.

Understanding the importance of retention is as simply as learning what you need to do to make sure the student knows everything they need to succeed. If a detailed outline is given, the student has in front of them, the steps to succeed in your classroom. Set the tone early, and never forget to remind them of these steps. Retention equals preperation plus guidance.

I feel it is important to know where your students came from and where they have been. They feed off information through personal expierence that will help shape the cirriculum you are trying to teach. This valuable information can be used to help solidfy the principals you are trying to convey. The students must have the opportunity to share this expierence in the classroom. With this added insight, the core of the class with feel more confident in their abilities to learn thr material.

Students attention spans have short fuses. Your goal as an instructor is to be efficient and entertaining. Students need to not only learn the material you are lecturing, but as well must stay focused during your lecture. Finding that balance between the two is the key to delivering a great lecture.

First impressions are everything! Professionalism is the key. The way you walk, talk, dress and present yourself the first day will set the tone for how your students will acknowledge you the rest of the term.

I feel it is important to spend a week at a time devoting one's self to the next week's cirriculum. Study the material and prepare it in a way that the student will not only ontain, but understand. By far the most important aspect to teaching for me is preperation and planning.

Being a new instructor, I feel it is important to have the oppurtunity to observe your peers. The fellow instructors at your facility hold valuable tools and ideas that you as a new instructor can pick up on and possibly use in your teaching style. Everyone should be granted to the chance to watch their co-workers in action and absorb as much knowledge as they can from the expierence. Steve Carnahan II ST P.D.