Teaching

My Phiosophy in Teaching

By their very nature, people are inquisitive. The goal of education should be to encourage seeking answers, as it is in this way that we advance. I seek to facilitate this advancement of knowledge, and the main theme of my teaching philosophy is reasoned thought.

Whether in the classroom or in meeting groups of the general public, my goal is to encourage thinking in rational ways, so that this can be applied in other, unfamiliar situations. I particularly emphasize learning to think about trends and directions (e.g. increasing this will decrease that), rather than rote memorization of facts.

In order to further encourage seeking answers to the questions around us, I try to encourage the questions themselves. All teachers should do so, but it is difficult to "allow the time" for this to take place, especially in a classroom setting. One way in which I have done this is to design a course based on answering questions. This is the Materials Science class that I have been developing since 1990. (Materials science has been deemed one of the two most important topics in chemistry currently--the other is biotechnology--but classes in materials sciences are extremely rare.) The class is based on first asking the questions (why are materials coloured as they are? how is heat stored? why is marble cold to the touch? etc.), and then developing the principles to explain the concepts as needed. This is just the reverse of most physical science classes where principles are presented and then a few examples are added at the end.

I am presently writing a textbook for this class. Judging from the interest in this class when I spoke about it at a national chemistry meeting and interest in a paper describing this class published in Canadian Chemical News, I expect that the publication of this textbook will lead to development of similar classes at many other institutions.

Another important element of my teaching philosophy is encouraging reasoned written and oral work, especially in developing logical arguments. A major factor of this is spending my time making suggestions, as students can only learn to present their ideas more effectively if someone shows them how and why modifications could be made to their natural style to make it clearer.

Finally, I aim to encourage a sense of wonderment in the world around us. Although I am a scientist and teach mostly science students, this is not, in my mind, an exclusive club. We are all scientists. We all wonder about the world around us. We must continue to ask the "how?" and "why?" questions in order to advance. Only if answers to these questions continue to come (either from the teacher, or, better yet, through reasoned thought on the part of the one asking), will the questions continue to flow.