| TWT Portfolio Home | Teaching Philosophy | TWT Statement | Courses Taught | Technology and the Classroom |
While my primary objectives as an instructor--to foster students’ critical reading, writing, and thinking skills--certainly provide a foundation for all my courses, I passionately believe it is crucial that students put those skills to work in contexts beyond the halls of the university. I hope to demonstrate and develop my students’ potential to be active participants in their communities (both locally and globally) by focusing on the importance of critical reflection. Passive observation of the world is not enough; I want my students to understand the complex motivations behind (and possible consequences of) particular modes of thought or action. This type of reflection moves beyond literary interpretation and analysis (though it is still useful for those or any academic pursuits) and allows students to question not just their own beliefs and preconceptions, but also the actions and biases of those around them. This is at times a challenging goal to accomplish, for both myself and the students, but ultimately, I believe, a fulfilling one.
In order to encourage this type of critical engagement with the world, I try to use reading assignments, technological tools, and class discussions to explore a broad range of current events, local issues, and topics based on the students’ concerns. While papers are organized based on the specific skills and requirements of each course, I allow students to develop their own paper topics according to their interests, and I encourage them to research and write about issues that help them broaden their knowledge of their communities, expand upon and interpret past experiences, or enhance their professional development. In order to help the students to see the classroom itself as a community, we develop and discuss student paper topics extensively in class. This allows the class to see both what other members of their community find important and how those issues might apply to them as well.
I believe that studying how local issues fit into global contexts is crucial to developing an appreciation for diversity and an ethical and compassionate understanding of our fellow citizens. To that end, I use local topics (often chosen by the students) to link to similar or related events happening statewide, nationally, or internationally. I also encourage my students to do their own research and incorporate a consideration of context into their writing. I believe that the internet is a crucial component of this research, and I take particular care to expand students’ knowledge of available online resources, focusing on databases and peer-reviewed journals but also discussing responsible use of more popular media in research and communication. In my courses (which also require students to move out into their communities to interview and observe their fellow citizens), students learn to critique various forms of discourse that they come across daily, ranging from blog exchanges to body language.
Although each of my courses has a critical technological component (for examples of this, please see my Teaching with Technology portfolio), the focus of my pedagogy is the course content itself. My courses foster active exchange on important issues, often turning the critical lens back on the classroom community through analyses of topics like the university system or the importance of English classes. To facilitate this discussion, I frequently follow brief individual writing exercises with small or large group reflection, allowing each student to bring his or her individual experiences and ideas to bear on the topics under consideration. Enhanced by online or visual examples, the spirited discussions provide a “real world” sense of importance to the traditional reading and writing components of the English classroom: as students learn to develop their understanding of themselves in relation to their communities, effective critical thinking and communication skills are given essential exigence.