Teaching Philosphy

The primary focus that I have as a teacher is to encourage the students to learn. I see my role, primarily, as a facilitator for learning. There is enough empirical evidence that suggest that learning is enhanced significantly when one is actively participating rather than just passively listening. Hence, my goal as a teacher is to find ways in which I can make students actively participate in classroom discourse. Towards this end, I want to encourage, inspire them to think on their own. I want to create an environment where even a non-feasible idea or thought is accepted gracefully so as not to discourage participation. The potential pitfall is, of course, getting bogged down in unfruitful discussions that limit adequate progress through the course content. With experience, I hope to learn this balance between active participation and depth & breadth of coverage.

Active learning is particularly essential in the teaching topics in Computer Engineering. It is important that students understand and use that understanding for design. Developing skills with tools, concepts and designs have to be emphasized using more than just the transmission of information in classroom settings. Students should be encouraged to analyze, synthesize and evaluate by themselves. In other words, they should be forced to explore and learn on their own, which will help them assimilate ideas faster and in a concrete manner.

In organizing my classroom plans, I intend to draw from existing wisdom. For example, it is a well-known fact that attention of students drops sharply after twenty minutes of lecture. Hence, after every ten to twenty minutes of lecturing one should stop introducing new ideas and spend some time on reinforcing the ideas that were presented. As a rough guideline it is recommended that 50% of the material presented in a class should be new and the rest should be reinforcements of previous lessons. It also helps to improve retention if a brief preview of prior material is presented prior to explanation of a new concept. Sometimes, previews, preferably using illustrations that draw analogies between old and new concepts help reinforce learning. The flow of a lecture is important as well. The lecture should be carefully structured in small modules that are linked in a step-by step fashion, where each step is a logically clear and coherent progression. Continuous monitoring of class understanding can be a vital feedback in improving ones classroom performance.

I personally feel that without good assignments that provide hands-on experience, learning is not complete. These assignments have to reinforce the concepts presented in class and help students develop deeper understanding. The tests and quizzes also should reflect the standard of the lectures and the assignments and should be set in a way that tests the understanding of the subject material. Another important duty of a teacher is to use the feedback obtained through tests, quizzes, and assignments for improvement and for steering the direction of exploration as the semester unfolds.