Gregory Cecil

Since I've earned my Masters degree, I've been branching out into a career in teaching. Many have asked what my "Teaching Philosophy" is, so I've published it here.

An instructor should be concerned with teaching just more than the assigned material for a class. An instructor should be striving to teach skills that the student can carry into their other courses and their future professions. With that in mind, there are four goals I strive to achieve while teaching my students.

1. To convey the class material in the most efficient manner that can accommodate the different ways and methods that students learn.

2. To improve the student’s speaking and writing abilities.

3. To teach the student critical thinking and problem solving skills.

4. To inspire a desire to learn and to be curious about the world and profession they live and work in.

Students absorb class material in different ways such as auditory, visual, and/or practical. Lectures along with having students read aloud class material will cover auditory methods of learning while multimedia presentations along with the use of props will cover visual learning methods. Props and hands on assignments can be used to teach students with practical learning methods. These different means of presenting the material overlap each of the three methods of learning. The goal is to incorporate all the means listed to optimize the student’s learning experience while assisting them to develop other areas of learning they may be weak in. A student who can comfortably learn the material via a method more in line with their learning style is more likely to retain the material and finish the class.

The ability to communicate by speaking and writing effectively is the cornerstone all professional and academic endeavors in life. A student should come out of a class a better speaker and writer no matter what the subject that is being taught. Having students do presentations or “teach” a small subject to their classmates strengthens their speaking skills. Short PowerPoint presentations would assist the student in developing both skill sets. Written reports varying in size from paragraph summaries to full size term papers should be utilized in the class curriculum to encourage writing skills.

The ability to think critically and problem solve will be part of the class curriculum. Essay questions should be incorporated into tests and quizzes to not only promote critical thinking, but writing skills. Problem solving examples and scenarios that pertain to the class material would be presented for class discussion.

Inspiring the desire to learn and to improve a student’s natural curiosity can only be accomplished by providing them the tools they need to answer the endless questions of “why.” Many students already have that natural curiosity, but without tools to use many students will simply give up. Achieving the first three goals listed above, will give those students the tools needed to find the answers to their many questions. It is the final and ultimate goal of this instructor to inspire his students a lifelong desire to learn.