Teaching Philosophy Thoughts

I thought I'd do a little independent research for the blog entry on teaching philosophies. According to the definition of one website I went to, a teaching philosophy is "a self-reflective statement of your beliefs about teaching and learning." To my mind, this says that every teaching philosophy is different, since they're individually tailored. One could use "The Incredibles" logic to say that because all teaching philosophies are different/unique, none of them are, but I'm just being difficult for the sake of doing so.

I've enjoyed thinking about my own teaching philosophy a great deal, both in terms of what I'd like to do in a classroom and in terms of what I've enjoyed as far as learning experiences have gone over the years. The best teachers I've had kept me active without driving me nuts. My sophomore year (of high school) English teacher, for example, used to do in class activities designed to generate an emotional response from the audience related to what the characters were experiencing in whatever we were reading (ex: when we read 1984, she generated paranoia, when we read Animal Farm, she ostracized one of the most popular kids in the class for two days). While this could be traumatic at times, it made me like what we were reading more, because it made me sympathetic to the characters in question.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure something so creative fits in with our composition curriculum, but my philosophy would, as best as I could make it do so, center around keeping the students moving. You want them to understand the material, and to understand it, they have to relate to it. When I watched Aaron Alford teach, he used Dave Chappelle videos to illustrate argument. I thought that was a hell of an idea. Everyone likes Dave Chappelle.

To an extent, there's definitely selfishness in this teaching philosophy. I don't want to be bored any more than the students do, so by keeping them moving, I hope to keep myself moving as well. If I'm engaged, I can teach them better. If I can teach better, they should learn better. I'd want substance when I taught, but there's nothing wrong with a little style, too.