Teaching Instruction
My approach as an educator is compassionate, affirming, and non-hierarchical. I believe this begins with a peaceful, nurturing environment that supports student needs and expectations through parallel instruction and socio-emotional learning. I am also a culturally responsive instructor who is dedicated to teaching students how to think and create critically about new topics and creative strategies. Together we discuss materials using the Socratic seminar method and group activities. Students are encouraged to make connections to the material by discussing their own personal wisdoms, curiosities, and experiences, as well as bringing previous educational knowledge into the classroom.
Teaching a variety of students with different learning styles to become independent learners makes scaffolding and Universal Design for Learning crucial to my practice. I present complex topics by presenting big ideas in segments. Clear, concise student learning outcomes are also provided for each lesson in advance to ensure that students know what to expect. Topics and creative strategies are introduced through a variety of mediums such as video, image, text, Socratic discussion and audio files to help students synthesize their understanding of the information. For example, students may read articles on creative writers in special topics and watch videos that support that reading. These instructional strategies offer students choice as well as different access points that take educational gaps into consideration while still providing challenging materials throughout the semester as their reading and comprehension skills grow. To keep the conversation on topic and timely, students prepare a list of questions and topics related to homework material in advance to utilize during the discussion portion of our lesson plan.
As pacing is important to the learning process, pauses for reflection are provided during class discussion to avoid overwhelm. Pair and shares are also practiced when appropriate for new material following lectures to allow students to engage in social learning at a comfortable pace while also building rapport with peers. Students are comfortable to engage with new ideas and creative strategies in their art making. The more comfortable they feel, I believe, the more they are able to challenge themselves on their learning journey.
