What does it mean to teach?

The accepted definition for teaching is to simply impart knowledge; if the student leaves believing something as fact that they did not before, the teacher has successfully taught.?But is that all it means to teach? I think that this definition neglects to communicate the importance of teaching and being taught in our communities and societies. It oversimplifies the responsibility of those who teach to present unbiased and contextualised facts and, denies the fact that we are all always learning and evolving regardless of formal teaching and mentoring. We have all had good teachers and bad teachers, learnt things that are true and been led to believe in falsehoods, we all have experiences that shape the way we think and learn. We have also all been teachers formal or informal but, what does it mean to be a good teacher and, how can that teaching philosophy translate into formal education settings? I have been “teaching” in the formal education system for some time, being a peer mentor in high school, working as a tutor during my undergraduate studies and now working formally for the university teaching practicals, tutorials, and workshops. But until more recently I had not taken the time to really delve into what I value in a teacher and how I can emulate that in my classrooms. This blog will explore these values and goals and I hope will inspire others who teach to really stop and think about their teaching style and what they aim to achieve through teaching.

The first thing I considered when investigating my teaching philosophy is, what qualities I most appreciated in my own teachers and how I can incorporate those qualities in my own practice. I was very lucky in high school to have many great teachers, at university, I was less fortunate and had some really quite poor lecturers and just a handful of amazing ones. So, what made the distinction, I would say the most distinguishing factor was their enthusiasm, with few exceptions my favourite teachers showed a passion for the subject they taught and the poor ones came to class just barely on time and gave a dry presentation. Another factor was class interactions, where a more interactive teacher who was good at answering questions and piquing the class’s interest inspired me to learn more than those who preferred a silent classroom. On reflection, the old adage, “those that can’t do teach”, should really be changed to “those who love to teach, teach”, because it really is the love for teaching that makes a good teacher. Perhaps this is biased as I have long said how much I enjoy teaching, but I’d like to think that my own experiences as a student, and the feedback I receive from my students is enough evidence to show the enjoyment I get out of teaching is reciprocated in my students.

The next thing to consider is what I value, and what are my core beliefs. I love fun, I think that enjoying life and spending time on the things you enjoy is fundamental to living a good life. I also believe in the value of diversity and inclusion, broadening each other’s horizons. And lastly, I believe in humility and the value of being able to change when presented with new facts. So how are these values being expressed in my teaching, and if they are not, what can I do to change that? This one is a bit harder to reflect on because it’s much more subjective. It’s easy to say “yes yes yes” especially because of the positive feedback I receive in the student feedback surveys. But I think it’s important to remember that the student evaluations are more likely to be completed by the students you engaged more and also how age can affect your ability to connect authentically with your students and be inclusive. So, in the end, I think that yes at the moment I am teaching by my values but, I also think that the small age gap between my students and I make that very easy at the moment and as I progress through my career I will have to make more of a concerted effort to keep in touch with the values of “the youth” to ensure I am not just keeping up with social norms but understanding the perspectives of the next generation to maintain an inclusive safe learning environment for all.

The final consideration was my goal in teaching, what are the key messages I wanted to impart to all my students. Although I ultimately want all my students to fall in love with chemistry the way I have, I know that is not realistic. A lot of my students are completing first-year chemistry as one of their compulsory units and will likely never touch a chemistry textbook again. So my goal is to spark their interest and get them to understand the fundamentals and how they can apply them to everyday life and their future studies. I want them to leave knowing that chemistry is not as hard or uninteresting as they first thought, and I want my own passion for what I do to inspire them to choose a path that interests them above what might be expected of them. Most of all I want them to learn to learn, to be discerning about what they believe and understand the scientific method. Now these are lofty goals and every student learns differently but, I think that continuing to have interactive sections of my lessons and expressing to my students my own enthusiasm for my research and giving real-world examples of scientific phenomena keep my teaching practice in line with these goals. I hope that as I evolve and learn myself as an educator, I will become more confident that I am reaching these goals.

So, what’s my teaching philosophy? Overall connecting with students and getting them to engage with the content are my main aspirations. I think that I have room to improve and will continue to leave myself open to learning from my mentors and students alike. After this reflection, I realise the importance of setting these goals and aim to remind myself frequently of what I have written here at the start of my career and reflect on what changed what stayed the same and why as I progress.