This is an excellent summation of my personal feelings on the subject of teaching. I do not believe that teaching requires mastery in any particular style, but the flexibility to adapt to any given situation. Knowing multiple approaches allows you to possibly shift gears with particular individuals or possibly even the entire class (worst case scenario to be sure). I make it a point to also express the pitfalls that they will undoubtedly face in the workplace. What I like to do is present them with a situation I have experienced and ask the class what they would have done in my position. This promotes thinking outside the box sometimes and I feel that in today's work environment, they NEED to be prepared to do just that. Consequently, that was the approach of one of my favorite instructors.
Hi Jason:
Being confident adds to expressing a competence to students. That's what they expect from our past experiences, training and education, and knowledge. Confidence can add a great deal to the students perception of their instructor.
Regards, Barry
It is very important to understanding yourself as an instructor. By understandind your instructor type enables you to reach out to the student during lecture making sure they understand the lesson that is being taught. Offering examples and asking questions during lecture helps keeps the students focus.
I am an auto collision repair instructor with over 30 years of field experience as a shop owner. Doing the work was easier than teaching it. I have had to take a hard look at myself in the last 7 years of teaching my students. Different students need different approaches or techniques to acheive success and you may find yourself using several teaching styles. Keeping your enthusiasm and focus on the end result will illustrate to each student that you care about them and thier chosen career. This in turn instills confidence in them, helping to develope thier new skills making them competative in the work force.
Hi Fredrik:
Great questions! Probably a huge discussion potential here. One idea that comes to mind is that a number of our students can not effectively read when they leave high school. There are similar trends based on studies that have been done on the subject with other subjects like math and english.
For the United States, this is a big contributor to the concept you describe.
Regards, Barry
It's very important to understand who you are as an instructor. Each day we are faced with new challenges and new experiences. Knowing our strengths and weaknesses as classroom leaders can help us better prepare for the next challenge because we are better able to address and improve upon those weaknesses. For example, I am a shy person in my everyday life; however, I've learned to enter a different persona in front of the classroom. In the classroom, I can be out-going, energetic, and authoritative. I have to continuously make an effort to reach out to students and talk with them, often trying to speak with each one before and after class, to build that connection and help mitigate my natural shyness. It's hard, but putting in the work to overcome the parts of my personality that could be considered weaknesses in the classroom is worth it.
On a side note, I've read a lot of comments about using stories of personal experiences (mistakes, successes) in the classroom. I love this idea, and try to practice this myself. As an English instructor, though, I find it hard to think of stories to share with my classes (consisting of students in health fields, business, and cosmetology, mostly). My experiences don't quite relate to them (though I can use my more general stories regarding language use effectively). I've found that I not only need to know myself, but I need to know people in the fields they plan to enter, so I can find stories that relate to them.
Thanks for the guidance. This section made me take a good look at my own strengths and weaknesses. Always a good idea to evaluate yourself before evaluating anyone else.
When I began as an instructor, I felt that I had to establish a high standard of learning with no compromise. It took several terms before I learned that there were many aspects to the instructor's role that I had to learn. Things only get better, when we work on our role in order to benefit the student's learning experience. Learning will occur when we work with the student.
I started to share my struggles with math as a student with the students in my math courses. This lets them see that their instructor had similar struggles, and this puts them at ease even though they still don't like the subject.
I understand that my personality has a major impact on the way my student learn. I need to develope and use my personality strengths to become an instructional leader and class manager.
Hi Barry,
Yes, I agree. I have only been teaching a short while now, but the students love to hear my true life stories of caring for patients as an RN- they say they can relate to my stories of caring for patients. Yes, my 17 years as a nurse has definetly influenced me as to who I am today.
Crystal
You have hit the nail on the head..Students want this...
You should know your strenghths and go with it but work every class to build on your weaknesses.
I always try at the end of the day to reflect on myself by asking the students some key questions on points they should have picked up on in class ,if over half the class has picked up on them then I feel I have accomplished something throughout the day
I feel you have to know your strengths and weaknesses. To utilize your strength and work on your weakness is instrumental in becoming a great instructor. To understand yourself has an overall effect - if you are confident in teaching the class the students will respond to you in a positive way. This helps creates an environment for learning.
It is important to know our incentive to teach. I like to be driven by the desire of helping the students to know what they really need to work successfuoly in real life.
To improve the points of weakness and use the strengths
Hi Tom:
What I like best about what you described is that it promotes an attituded of flexibility with yourself and with looking at how effective we are with our instruction to students.
Regards, Barry
Hi Lise:
One way to get to know yourself as an instructor is to consider using a teaching journal on a daily basis and track what worked and what didn't in the class, including opinions you made, or techniques you tried.
Regards, Barry
Hi Alice:
What most educational enthusiasts have come to believe is that the most effective method of instruction is using a variety of teaching methods to more effectively address as many learning styles as possible.
Regards, Barry
