TEACHING PHILOSOPHY
TEACHING PHILOSOPHY
I became a teacher by default, today I am a teacher by choice.
I finished my MBA in June 1976, during the worst economic recession of the post WWII era. Jobs were scarce. I got a job working for a consulting firm in Cincinnati, but I only stayed a month, because I did not like the job or the location. I had worked as a Graduate Assistant at the University of Georgia, so I knew that I felt comfortable in the classroom. I applied for teaching jobs as a fall back position until I could find something "better." When I was offered a teaching position at Macon Junior College, I gratefully accepted.
Although I did not intend to stay in academia long, somehow I never left. I enjoyed teaching, and I matured as a teacher. I was innovative and received good student and performance evaluations. I also began work on my Ed.D. to insure my advancement in the profession.
In 1981, I accepted a full time public service administrative position without teaching responsibilities. However, I continued to teach part-time, for the money and because I enjoyed it. I also felt I was good at it, and therefore, it gave me satisfaction.
I held various public service jobs over the next ten years. I advanced rapidly, and while I was challenged, I missed teaching. I wanted to stay in administration, but I also wanted to have more teaching responsibilities than the public service sector of academia allowed. I continued to teach part-time when I had the opportunity.
In 1991, I found what I wanted when I became Chairman of the Division of Business at ABAC: a chance to stay in administration, while continuing to teach. My enjoyment of the classroom, helps to offset the frustrations of administration. The satisfaction I feel from seeing a student succeed overcomes any amount of disappointment that may be created by my administrative dealings.
My philosophy is simple. Focus on the student, give him or her every opportunity to succeed, and stress critical thinking skills over discipline content.
Students must be the main focus of the classroom. An effective teacher must make an effort to understand the needs of each student and to meet as many of those needs as possible without "spoon feeding." An effective teacher must assess the abilities of each student and establish ambitious but achievable goals for each, and for the class as a whole. An effective teacher must attempt to communicate (speak and listen) to each student. It is not acceptable to allow any student to sit quietly, without participating in the class. At the same time, an effective teacher must recognize the fears, weaknesses, and limitations of each student, so that the student might feel pushed, but never dragged, toward an expected result .
Students should not be allowed to lose hope in a class. They should be given every opportunity to succeed. Because all students learn differently, content must be presented in varied modes. Likewise students must be given different opportunities and avenues to show that they have met the expected learning outcomes. An effective teacher should not be afraid to give a student another chance, or to sort material into smaller modules for those having difficulty. And, no teacher should imply that they are "maintaining standards" as an excuse for inflexibility.
An effective teacher must also be realistic. How much specific discipline content can a student be expected to retain in the long run? A teacher will have a greater effect upon a student if he focuses on the development of critical problem solving skills. If effectively learned, these skills will be practiced on a daily basis and retained. It has been said: "If you give a person a fish, they will eat for a day. But if you teach a person to fish, they will eat for a lifetime." I hope my students learn to think more effectively. Then, if they need specific economic content, they will know where to find it and how to apply it. Too few people think after they leave school.
Selfishly, I do hope that my students retain some appreciation of economics as a way of evaluating issues. If I can influence my students to become more effective decision makers, they will be better able to improve their socio-economic status. It is Capitalism in the classroom: the theory applied. Students improve their human capital and are better off. Then, we are all better off. Mark Twain once said " The eighth wonder of the world is the American economic system and the ninth wonder of the world is the American people’s ignorance of the American economic system." My discipline goal is to alleviate this ignorance.
Most of my students are taking economics for the first time. They find that this subject has its own vocabulary, and can be boring, difficult to read about, and, if the instructor is not careful, excessively abstract and theoretical. An effective instructor must not forget these constraints and must give them as much attention as course content.
The boredom associated with this class can be eliminated through varying delivery techniques. As a teacher of more than 20 years, I still enjoy the lecture method. I also realize that the students of today appreciate (as they have told me so many times) the use of multimedia technology to enhance and improve the structure of classroom sessions. I believe strongly in classroom discussions (although they are often hard to keep on track), and give my students incentives to spend adequate time with the computer based tutorials outside of class. Humor can also be effective, but I try to be careful not to give the students a false sense of the level of difficulty associated with the material.
To alleviate the reading problem, I prepare a reading schedule that I give out the first day of class. I encourage students to read a minimum of 15 minutes every day, instead of trying to absorb larger amounts in one setting. I try to encourage this behavior by asking questions from the assigned reading during the first of every class day. Also because economics is a problem-oriented class, I assign questions or problems from the text for extra credit.
To make economics less abstract, I stress its applied nature rather than the theoretical side. One strategy I use is a series of current events (3 to 4 per quarter). Each student is asked to identify a local issue that specifically concerns them. After researching the issue, they are required to apply appropriate economic concepts to analyze the issue and propose alternative solutions. Students must present and defend their solutions orally. These exercises require a multitude of skills: critical thinking, problem solving, decision making, researching, writing, speaking, and listening. These exercises bring the class out of the "Ivory Tower" and seek to explore issues that directly affect the student, usually in the pocketbook, an area that evokes acute concern.
Lastly, I try to stay attuned to my students. I try to read the expressions on their faces and react to any non-verbal indicators of frustration and confusion. I am not hesitant to confront a student, privately if appropriate, if the student appears to have lost concern for my class. I try to be as empathic as possible and assume (sometimes foolishly) that students will be honest and try hard if I am honest and fair to them.