The overarching theme of my development as an instructor can be encapsulated in “we cannot unravel the truth without recognizing the threads” (Brown, p.103). The philosophy I delineate herein was a corollary of missteps that prodded me to ferret out the right path to create a beneficial and enjoyable learning environment. 

Immediately after graduation with a bachelor from the Faculty of Pharmacy at Cairo University, Egypt, I was appointed as a teaching assistant in the same school. Among my teaching duties, I facilitated several tutorials and discussion sections wherein students would apply the knowledge they acquired in classes to solve clinical problems. Needless to say, at that time, classes were solely pedantic lectures given to hundreds of students in a unidirectional manner, from faculty to students with minimal interaction. In contrast, the tutorials were primarily problem-based, which presumably allures students’ engagement. Nonetheless, by looking at students’ faces, I could sense their boredom and lack of interest in the content. Therefore, I always solicited informal, anonymous feedback from students on my performance and the tutorials. I was dismayed by students’ feedback that revealed that I emulated the dull, conventional unidirectional way of teaching I had experienced as a student. Paradoxically, I abhorred that teaching style when I was a student. However, my students’ feedback produced an “aha” moment to reflect on my practices. Then, I determined that my ultimate goal was to help students think like pharmacists. That could be categorically achieved by enhancing students ‘motivation and engagement. By highlighting the link between class and life, students will crave for knowledge. I failed to show the value of what they were learning and how they could apply it to patients outside class. Importantly, I learned that I should provide my students with the adequate tools and knowledge resources that help them reach the factual content they need. Before, I merely was providing them with that factual content without showing them how to attain it. 

Although I floundered in the beginning of my teaching career, that was inevitable to “recognize the threads”—facing the problem and identifying the shortcomings. Since I started my PhD, I have sought adequate knowledge to improve my teaching skills. Concomitantly, “the truth was unraveled” by determining what type of instructor I want to be in my future career. Above all, students’ feedback became the meter whereby I will always rely on to recalibrate my expectations and performance. 

With more forethought to avoid previous mistakes, I want to implement bidirectional (learner-centered) pedagogy where the onus of learning is shifted to be a shared responsibility for me and students. Of course, I cannot jettison conventional lecturing completely; it is sometimes important to pass intricate concepts. The ultimate goal of my future teaching career is to teach students to think like neuroscientists, but this time I am more aware of the needed tools, resources, and skills students should attain to achieve that goal. That primary goal bifurcates to neuroscience-specific and nonspecific goals. Neuroscience-nonspecific goals will direct students to acquire transferrable skills to any course or career. In particular, I am committed to teaching students how to create “concept maps” to connect seemingly discrete dispersed information and principles. Not only neuroscience, but Biomedical sciences in general subsume intertwined concepts and theories that cannot be understood in isolation. As a researcher, building concept maps is an indispensable tool for preparing for a talk, planning an experiment, and even writing this teaching statement. Having studied the tenets of learning and information processing in the brain, it has become clear that concept maps prolong information retention and deepen comprehension. For the students to link pieces of information into once cohesive map efficiently, they might need to refer to primary sources in addition to class materials. That will serve my next goal-boosting students’ critical thinking. To do so, students will be trained to evaluate and compare different pieces of information in the literature and determine what gap of knowledge this information fills. I envision that this goal is better accomplished through collaborative activities. Collaborative activities will be streamlined so that each student has a specified role in addressing the prompt and formulating the argument. In that way, students enrich each other and, as a result, build their teamwork capacities.

As a neuroscience educator, I want my students to appreciate the marvels of the brain. That could not be entirely achieved through humdrum lecturing from textbooks. Rather, I will allocate time for activities that subserve tying class materials to our quotidian practices and hobbies. For instance, students will need to predict which brain regions are involved in playing soccer and shooting the ball. According to what they learn in class, they can also explain the changes in brain wiring that take place with continuous practicing. Neuroscience textbooks are replete with colorful cartoons of the human brain with clear demarcation of different regions. Clearly, our brain does not bear these nice, color-coded areas. I venture to say that many “neuroscientists” feel befuddled when they see a real human brain that they cannot distinguish different brain areas. Given the fact that students feel enriched with real life connections, planning a human brain anatomy lab will be inextricable from my syllabus. Another goal I will dedicate my effort to achieve is uncovering and debunking renowned misconceptions about the brain. Growing up, we all were exposed to a myriad of mythical misconceptions about the brain, especially from the media. A lot of those misconceptions became entrenched as part of childhood memories. A famous one is that we use only 10% of our brains. My philosophy is to lay the groundwork for my students to master tackling the misconceptions. To this end, background knowledge and misconceptions should be surfaced through simple prompts at the beginning of the class. After learning pertinent scientific information, students will have the capacity to give the scientific foundation to refute those misconceptions.

To evoke the spirit that we are one team, I strongly believe that assessment, being part of a wholesome pedagogy, should be bidirectional. Continuous progressive feedback to students is crucial for their development and success. Students’ assessment align with learning goals to gauge effectively how far students are from achieving those goals. On the whole, my teaching will be a combination of formative and summative approaches. I believe that assessment should be nothing short of another learning opportunity for my students. Students’ assessment and exams have categorically been imbued with a punitive mindset for far too long, leading to a culture of fear and anxiety in the classroom. Thence, one of my goals is to make assessments an opportunity for growth and motivation not punishment and discouragement. To this end, I will use a test correction policy to display that those tests are another learning opportunity.

Likewise, as an instructor, I need to know students’ perception of learning and coursework. Suffice it to say that soliciting informal feedback from students helped me to pinpoint shortcomings early in my career. Therefore, I will take the same pursuit without awaiting the official end-of-semester surveys. In that way, I will receive a continuous evaluation of my performance and course load to modify accordingly whenever possible. That attitude will make my students feel safe and comfortable.

Compared to Egypt, educational institutions here in the US are highly diverse. During my PhD, I have recognized that diversity not only alludes to different races or ethnicities, but it also encompasses students of different needs and background knowledge. The sea-change in my perception of what inclusion means was when I realized that, surprisingly, choosing PowerPoint colors matters. That simple task could profoundly impinge the learning process of a student with visual needs that otherwise would be overlooked. I am an outspoken, forthright person who can comfortably express their needs. However, my students will be heterogenous, and they will bear different personal attributes than me. Therefore, I will carry out regular check-ins using a Google form to sense the pulsebeat of the class. Students will anonymously disclose their struggles and needs. Then, it behooves me to respond promptly and make necessary changes to accommodate all students.

Teaching is formidable for me because of the impact an instructor might leave on students. That impact, good or bad, could be everlasting. Therefore, I should preemptively determine the values I want my students to leave the class with—academic and personal values. That is by no means a facile job. In this statement, I am cognizant that all my goals and plans to achieve those goals have yet to be applied in the future. In contrast to my bygone teaching practices, with all that I have been learning about effective pedagogy, I gained a foothold to start my future post-PhD teaching career. After all, there will be troughs sometimes; however, I will keep listening to others—students and faculty—and put the effort to rectify the flaws as I did before.