Rich's Learning/Teaching Philosophy FALL 2024 by Rachel Watson

Learning/Teaching Philosophy 9/8

rhall22_5 — 2024-09-08 21:08:09 UTC

Over my last few semesters as a TA for anatomy, I have learned that I prefer to allow students to make mistakes rather than just giving them information. I believe that failure is the best teacher, so my goal is to create a space where students feel comfortable trying to solve problems without much help initially. Oftentimes, this leads to a lot of mistakes and confusion, but I think this is where the most learning can happen. Once students start making mistakes I can step in as a guide to help shift their thought process toward the correct answers. Teaching in the anatomy lab is a great place to practice this. Rather than just sitting there and naming off structures on a model, I like to challenge students to name ones I point out. If they are having a hard time, I then help them along with hints or other tools to guide them toward the correct answer. All in all, my teaching philosophy centers around the idea of letting students make mistakes, then helping them learn from those experiences.

Reflection 9/9

rhall22_5 — 2024-09-10 00:06:02 UTC

After today, I realized that there are way more learning modalities out there than I thought. When we matched the modalities to their definitions with our teams at the end of class, I was shocked to see so many. Although I don't know what they all mean yet, I think this knowledge still informs my philosophy at this point.This diversity of tools shows how there is no one set way to do things. Perhaps I need to open my mind to what other avenues are available to help my teach others. As far as ensuring access to all students, I think there are a lot of neccesary things that must be in a classroom to make it accessible. Offering online access via Zoom, putting students in groups so they can work with pears, and having the space for instructors to be able to address individuals face-to-face are all crucial elements of an accessible classroom.

Reflection 9/16

rhall22_5 — 2024-09-17 00:10:07 UTC

I think our conversation about collaberative communication tonight was a crucial one when it comes to our role in the classroom. At its core, I believe that teaching is really the art of effective communication. If we as LAs cannot adequately digest questions from our students, then communicate back in such a way that allows the student to think about their own thought process, we are leaving a lot of meat on the bone with their learning. Specifically, the idea of asking open-ended questions really stuck out to me. Being able to ask students open-ended questions about what they are thinking and feelings is extremely valuable. Going back to my first post on 9/8, this was a principle I think I was getting at. I try to ask students questions in such a way that it forces them to reflect on their own thought processes, which can in turn reveal any mistakes or corrections that need to be made. Overall, I think this method of communication is one of the hallmarks of an effective educator and communicator. Without collaborative communication, neither student nor teacher will ever fully reach the depths of their own knowledge.

Reflection 9/23

rhall22_5 — 2024-09-23 23:54:40 UTC

I thought that this week's material was super interesting. There are so many ways in which neuroscience is ingrained in the process of active learning, and I think that my favorite concept was the idea of movement and learning. To think that we came from humans who were conditioned to be walking 20 miles a day, were constantly being challenged to think on the fly, and were really just professional movers is really cool to. Then, we decided to make ourselves try to sit still all day long. Given this knowledge, it makes complete sense that our brain thrives off of movement. Making this applicable to the classroom really has become paramount in my ever-forming concept of teaching and active learning. I think I would like to see a classroom were students were up and moving as much as possible, working together and getting more active. This could be seen in creating activities such as drawing on whiteboards, having students get up and move to different tables to interact with different people, or having students stand if they feel the need. All these things could be strategies to get people moving and their brains working. As far as making movement more accessible, there are a few things to consider. First, students who have physical limitations need to be adjusted for. This could mean moving tables and chairs such that wheelchairs can move freely in the space. Second, simply creating a space in the back of the classroom where students can stand and providing them with higher tables would be helpful.

Reflection 9/30

rhall22_5 — 2024-10-01 00:02:36 UTC

I think the major takeaway I had from today's learning was the idea of how class sizes have a dramatic affect on student performance. I have felt this personally in my own learning, sitting in a a lecture hall with 180 other students listening to a professor drone on about the content. It is tough. I have also felt what is like to be in a smaller classroom and have the ability to easily interact with other students and the professor. The difference is truly night and day. It really isn't surprising to me that the research supports the use of smaller groups in learning environments, and I will apply this by breaking up the students that I am helping to teach into smaller groups. As far as applying the use of double journal entries, I like how we did it today. I think they might be more effective when they are done with a partner rather than by yourself. I feel as if it might give the students the opportunity to bounce ideas off of each other when they are stuck, or discuss areas where they have differing opinions. This in turn will help get all students involved to a greater degree than if they are doing a journal entry by themselves.

Reflection 10/7

rhall22_5 — 2024-10-08 00:12:44 UTC

Tonight surprised me a little bit. To me, backwards course designed seemed logical. I thought it was common practice that teachers would have to identify what they want the outcomes to be for their students before they determine how to assess for and train toward these outcomes. To think that it isn't the norm is a little strange to me, but hopefully that changes in the future. As far as applying this principle to my philosophy, I think it is a very important principle to practice. I think that if I first determine what is the priority of things for my students to know, I will better be able to hone in on these things in the classroom. I have noticed times where I go into class and don't have much of game plan, and I ended up just kind of going on random tangents about all sorts of different things. This is not super useful to student learning. To put it briefly, I think that backwards course design is a way to maintain focus on what is important for a given class. Without it, the teacher could go through every semester teaching the same course, but every semester is a different experience. Consistency is key when it comes to teaching, and backwards course design further promotes that.

I think the main thing to consider when using online modalities for classroom is access for students who might not have the same amenitities as others. Some students might not have access to reliable internet connections, computers able to run newer applications/softwares, or just computers at all. It is then the role of the teacher to make sure that all students have what they need beforehand, then to help those who don't figure out how to get around issues that arise. Maybe that is in the form of having students go to the Coe Library or another place with public Wifi. There are probably more resources out there than that, but the teacher needs to take responsibility to make sure all students have access to what they need before using online formats for classrooms.

Reflection 10/21

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-04 03:48:49 UTC

This week, I definitely felt the struggle of trying to participate in an active learning class without having done the pre-party. I found myself trying to scramble during class to read material that I could find online to stay caught up with our discussion, which was quite stressful.

I did find the TBL to be useful in this situation however. Having specific questions come up to help guide my Google searching helped, and I actually did find what I was looking for in a semi-timely manner. However, this simultaneously made me a bit more distracted than I probably should have been while doing the TBL. I became more concerned with reading articles than doing the TBL, and I felt like I was taking too long.

Overall, I certainly felt the consequences of not doing the work ahead of class. But, I did go a little better than I thought it would. I can see how that would have been much worse if I was in an "actual" class that was deep in hard material, but I think it is doable.

Reflection 10/28

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-04 03:50:42 UTC

Reflection 11/4

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-05 01:10:13 UTC

This week's case study activity was interesting to me. I think I struggled defining what exactly a "problem" was in the context in the case study. However, I think it is a good thing that it was left a bit vague. It left it more up for interpretation to the reader, and when it came to sharing what we found with other groups, I heard a lot different perspectives that I wouldn't have thought of. If a "problem" had been super clearly defined in the instructions, I might not have heard as great of a variety of thoughts in our discussions. Overall, I felt a little confused at the beginning of the activity. However, as the activity continued and the group worked together, the task became more clear and more discoveries were made. At the end, I felt very enlightened listening to all the different ideas that everyone thought of in their groups.

I felt really included today. Our group on Zoom did a good job of asking everyone what they thought and taking into account what they said. When I spoke, I felt listened to, which made me feel more comfortable to speak my thoughts. I really like that aspect of the activity today.

Values

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-12 00:31:34 UTC

Outcomes

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-12 00:31:42 UTC

Pedagogies

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-12 00:31:52 UTC

Assessment

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-12 00:32:06 UTC

Need to find more for assessment?

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-12 00:45:59 UTC

Distill down what pedagogies I resonated with the most

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-12 00:47:00 UTC

Distill down values

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-12 00:48:35 UTC

What specific outcomes can I create from these?

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-12 00:49:33 UTC

Go check other Padlet

Reflection 11/18

rhall22_5 — 2024-11-19 01:01:53 UTC

How did it feel to flow through Kolb’s Cycle?

To me, this felt very much like an exercise in mindfulness. We were just talking about mindfulnesss in my exercise psycology class, so maybe it is just fresh in my mind, but this exercise very much felt like the type of reflectiveness that being mindfull requires. Both mindfulness and Kolb's cycle require that the individual center themselves in the present, grounding the individual in their experience in the here and now.

Which of Columbia’s Principles/UDL are exemplified in this learning activity?

I think the principle that most applied to this activity was the principle of emotional capacity. This is because emotional capacity has to do with awareness of self, which is very important to the activity we did.

If this were an activity that were evaluated for purposes of grading a student, what additional elements of Columbia’s Principles might we want to integrate?

Maybe we could consider integrating more clear expectations. Although we don't want to box anyone in during there reflection, perhaps giving them an example of what a quality reflection is would be beneficial.

Reflection 12/2

rhall22_5 — 2024-12-03 00:57:46 UTC

I think that the desparity between how one views themselves and how they view others has a lot to do with inclusion in the classroom. When I think about this topic, the first thing that comes to mind for me is that if a teacher views themselves as gritty but does not view their students in the same light, they are taking away an opportunity for their students to display/learn grittiness. That teacher could end up having the belief that they cannot make their class challenging since their students wouldn't be able to handle it. This attitude could be extremely detrimental to the learning of their students. If the student's grit is never challenged with hard, difficult tasks that require a certain level of persistance, they can never develop that trait. Furthermore, they will never develop the growth mindset that can be born from these challenges. All in all, if teachers don't believe in the grittiness of their students, they will never include them on the challenges that will ultimately drive them to growth.