How to Develop Your Teaching Statement

Developing a teaching statement can often feel overwhelming. You might wonder, "How do I know that I'm a good teacher?" or "What should I consider when developing my teaching statement and philosophy?"

I am a Postdoctoral Scholar at UCLA with extensive experience in instructional design, research, and academic development experience within the higher education sector. I have developed a process for developing impactful teaching statements that enables you to show your signature pedagogy and teaching effectiveness.

What Is a Teaching Statement?

Your teaching statement is a way of communicating your teaching philosophy, your pedagogical methods, and your personal values and beliefs about learning and teaching. A teaching statement can be used for various purposes, such as applying for a teaching position, seeking a promotion, or reflecting on your professional development.

• Your approach to teaching
• Adults’ learning theories you apply
• Your signature pedagogy: How do you teach?
• Andragogy: How do you teach to adult learners and how learning is applicable to students’ real-life situation and career goals?
• Heutagogy: How do you develop capacity, autonomy and capabilities in students?
• What are your goals and objectives as a facilitator?

Why to Write a Teaching Statement?

Writing a teaching statement can help you to:

• Clarify and rethink your own ideas and assumptions about teaching and learning
• Reflect and articulate your strengths and areas of improvement as a teacher
• Demonstrate your commitment and enthusiasm for teaching
• Showcase your achievements and impact as an educator
• Provide evidence of your effectiveness and innovation in different modes of teaching, including online, blended, or hybrid
• Align your teaching with the mission and vision, values and goals of your institution
• Connect with your students, colleagues, and potential employers

A Process for Teaching Statement Development

Follow the process below to create your teaching statement.

What to Include in a Teaching Statement?

Step 1: Develop Your Teaching Philosophy

Step 2: Include Your Teaching Methods

Step 3: Link your Teaching Philosophy to your Teaching Methods

Step 4: Add Your Teaching Experience

Step 5: Add Your Professional Development

Step 6: Add Your Curriculum or Course Design Experience

Step 7: Add Examples of Innovations

Step 8: Add Evidence of Accomplishments

Step 9: Include Your Future Plans

Revise and Polish Your Teaching Statement

Make It Stand Out

Step 1: Develop your Teaching Philosophy

Sometimes, it helps to think about teaching from the perspective of a student. By reflecting on the questions below and considering both your experiences as a student and a teacher, you can develop a teaching statement that is thoughtful, coherent, and reflective of your unique teaching approach and objectives.

• Draw inspiration from your teachers by considering the following guide questions:
• Who was your favorite teacher, and why
• What was your least favorite class, and why?
• What did you learn, and how did those learning experiences shape your professional and personal world? What did you take away from those experiences?
• How did you learn, and why did you prefer certain teaching methods?
• What policies or activities did your favorite teachers implement that you found valuable?
• Have you modeled any of those practices in your own classroom? If so, how?
• Which of those teaching strategies are closest to your heart, and why?

Consider your responses to the prompts above. Map out your responses using the questions below and try to flesh out your teaching philosophy. Now, develop your teaching philosophy. This is a statement of your beliefs and values about teaching and learning, and how they inform your practice. You can address questions in the areas below:

Constructive Alignment

1. What is the purpose of teaching?
2. What are the desired learning outcomes?
3. How do you develop course learning outcomes and weekly learning objectives?
4. How do you design your syllabus, learning outcomes, weekly content, and associated tasks?
5. How do you design effective assessments in the age of AI?
6. How do you ensure that program/course learning outcomes, weekly content, and associated tasks are aligned?

Scaffolded Learning

1. How do you ensure consistency in course design and teaching?
2. Do you develop weekly intro videos?
3. How do you stay current with developments in your field and integrate new knowledge into each module?
4. How do you present content in each week/module?

Active Learning

1. How do you view your role and responsibilities as a teacher?
2. How do you motivate and engage your students?
3. How do you support your students to interact with the content, peers and yourself?
4. What kinds of tasks do you design for your face to face/webinar sessions?
5. Do you design different task types including assimilative, social, productive, experiential interactive and metacognitive tasks? What are some examples?

Technology Enhanced Learning

1. What kinds of technologies do you use for teaching, and why?
2. What are students’ perceptions of these technologies?
3. How do you clarify these technologies with the student

Inclusive Teaching

1. How do you create a positive and inclusive learning environment?
2. Do you adhere to university guidelines around accessibility? If so, how?

Feedback-focused learning

1. How do you provide feedback and feedforward?
2. Do you leverage technology to provide immediate feedback to students?
3. What strategies do you use for peer feedbacK.

Step 2: Include Your Teaching Methods

This is a description of your pedagogical strategies and techniques. Potential teaching strategies to consider include:

• Collaborative learning
• Reflective learning
• Experiential learning
• Case based learning
• Active learning
• Feedback-focused learning
• Social learning
• Problem-based learning
• Inquiry based learning
• E-portfolio based learning
• Flipped approach to learning
• AI based learning
• Technology enhanced learning

Step 3: Link your Philosophy to Your Teaching Methods

How do your teaching methods support your teaching philosophy and goals? You can address questions such as:

How do you teach online?

• How do you teach face-to-face?
• How do you teach in a blended mode?
• What are the main methods and approaches you use in your teaching?
• How do you design and deliver your courses and lessons?
• How do you use technology and other resources in your teaching?
• How do you adapt your teaching to different contexts and situations?
• How do you address diversity and inclusion in your teaching?

Step 4: Add Your Teaching Experience

This is a summary of your teaching history and achievements and how they demonstrate your effectiveness and impact as a teacher. You can address questions such as:

• What courses and levels have you taught or are currently teaching?
• What modalities have you taught in? Online, face-to-face, blended, or hybrid?
• What was your role? Teaching Assistant (TA), Teaching Associate, Teaching Fellow, or main facilitator?

Step 5: Add Your Professional Development

This is a reflection of your teaching strengths and areas of improvement, and how you seek and use feedback and opportunities for professional learning. You can address questions such as:

• What are the strengths and weaknesses of your teaching?
• How do you evaluate and improve your teaching?
• How do you seek and use feedback from your students, peers, mentors, or supervisors?

How do you engage in professional development activities, such as workshops, courses, conferences, or research?

Step 6: Add Your Curriculum or Course Design Experience

Another aspect of teaching statement might include your course/ assessment design experience. Name some of the courses, assessments or rubrics you have designed.

Step 7: Add Examples of Innovations

Provide examples of how you brought attractiveness and uniqueness to the teaching and learning context. Here are some examples:

• Video Assessment: For the Shaping Organisations with Artificial Intelligence course, I designed assessments where students applied the concepts and techniques learned in the course to a real-world problem. The students recorded a video presentation of their proposal, implementation, and evaluation for the executive board and responded to three questions to demonstrate how they handled potential rejection by the executives.
• E-Portfolio-Based Assessments: Focused on the process of learning rather than the final product to address academic integrity issues in the age of AI.
• Podcast and Vodcast Creation: In collaboration with the SME we recorded podcasts for each module to present content in a more engaging way.
• Digital Storytelling: Students gathered, analyzed, and evaluated course content to create a digital story with peers and facilitators and then shared their digital story based on what they learned.

Step 8: Add Evidence of Accomplishments

Do not forget to add evidence of accomplishments such as students’ feedback, testimonials, and recognitions and rewards to your statement.

Step 9: Include Your Future Plans

Discuss how you will apply your teaching strategies and experiences to your future role. Tailor this section to the job description, highlighting your commitment to teaching, mentoring, and your ability to engage with diverse and underrepresented student populations.

Revise and Polish Your Teaching Statement

1. Keep in concise and focused.
2. Make sure your ideas are well-organised and connected, and your sentences are clear and concise.
3. Make it personal and authentic.
4. ?Make it evidence based and reflective
5. A teaching statement is typically one to two pages, single-spaced.
6. Ask for feedback

Make it Standout

You can create a professional and visually appealing e-portfolio using Wix.com , which offers free website creation tools. Platforms like Canva and Genially can help you design engaging e-portfolios with a variety of templates and interactive features.