Teaching Philosophy
For me, teaching comes from a place of love -- a love of the individual learner and a love of the learning process. Through a number of teaching and learning experiences including supervising residents and medical students in clinical settings, directing a longitudinal clerkship for pre-clinical medical students, designing curricula for family medicine residents, teaching faculty development sessions, creating a faculty development fellowship and taking Master’s level courses in medical education, I have distilled my mission as a teacher into three core beliefs that are rooted in a constructivist approach to learning (that learning is not passively acquired but rather meaning is built through experiences):
The learning environment influences how learners make sense of their experiences. Relationship building with my learners is the foundation. Knowing my learners personally, including their interests and the people in their lives that are important to them, and academically (i.e. assessment of strengths and deficiencies) is the first step. Trust is developed over time by establishing a collaborative teacher-learner relationship. Learners help to set the teaching agenda or may be asked to select the teaching method. I make myself vulnerable by telling them what I don’t know and sharing my past mistakes.
Knowles’ theory of andragogy highlights the importance of appropriate levels of autonomy in adult learners. Thus, it is essential for me, the teacher, to know where my learner is on the road to mastery, and then to provide the appropriate amount of scaffolding – just enough support and supervision from me to push them to the next level (also known as the zone of proximal development). As the learner becomes more proficient in a particular topic or skill, the amount of scaffolding can be reduced until eventually the learner is independent. Feedback is at the heart of deliberate practice and is better received when there is a foundation of trust between teacher and learner. Feedback is also a two-way street and I explicitly seek feedback from my learners and strive to incorporate it into my teaching.
Challenging the learner to connect current and prior learning by offering diverse experiences helps them to create strong connections between topics, thereby allowing quick retrieval of the learning when needed in the future. I encourage the development of connections by using visuals that compare and contrast symptoms or diagnoses. When conducting teaching rounds in the hospital, I prompt learners to consider slight variations to the current patient scenario through strategic questioning: What if you were in the office, then how would you approach this? What if they were allergic to that medicine, then what would you prescribe? Through this mental practice, they will hopefully be prepared when confronted with the scenario in the future.
- A learning environment that supports vulnerability is the key to creating transformational learning experiences
- Increasing autonomy through deliberate practice and diversity of experiences helps learners to develop mastery
- Organizing knowledge and metacognition are teachable skills
The learning environment influences how learners make sense of their experiences. Relationship building with my learners is the foundation. Knowing my learners personally, including their interests and the people in their lives that are important to them, and academically (i.e. assessment of strengths and deficiencies) is the first step. Trust is developed over time by establishing a collaborative teacher-learner relationship. Learners help to set the teaching agenda or may be asked to select the teaching method. I make myself vulnerable by telling them what I don’t know and sharing my past mistakes.
Knowles’ theory of andragogy highlights the importance of appropriate levels of autonomy in adult learners. Thus, it is essential for me, the teacher, to know where my learner is on the road to mastery, and then to provide the appropriate amount of scaffolding – just enough support and supervision from me to push them to the next level (also known as the zone of proximal development). As the learner becomes more proficient in a particular topic or skill, the amount of scaffolding can be reduced until eventually the learner is independent. Feedback is at the heart of deliberate practice and is better received when there is a foundation of trust between teacher and learner. Feedback is also a two-way street and I explicitly seek feedback from my learners and strive to incorporate it into my teaching.
Challenging the learner to connect current and prior learning by offering diverse experiences helps them to create strong connections between topics, thereby allowing quick retrieval of the learning when needed in the future. I encourage the development of connections by using visuals that compare and contrast symptoms or diagnoses. When conducting teaching rounds in the hospital, I prompt learners to consider slight variations to the current patient scenario through strategic questioning: What if you were in the office, then how would you approach this? What if they were allergic to that medicine, then what would you prescribe? Through this mental practice, they will hopefully be prepared when confronted with the scenario in the future.
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"For me, teaching comes from a place of love --
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