Teaching

Many of the artifacts displayed in the other sections of this portfolio provide an in-depth glimpse of various aspects of my knowledge as a language teacher. However, they do not necessarily provide an example or reflection of my actual teaching experiences, where I have had the opportunity to put my knowledge to use and grow. To best display howmy growth as a student and educator through putting these principles into practice, I am including a final course practicum reflection, a final tutoring report, and the introduction from my sample curriculum design project, where I detail aspects of my personal teaching philosophy. These artifacts serve not only as examples of the time spent with students in the classroom, but additionally as vehicles for self-reflection and personal growth that ultimately seeks to build the skills of an effective educator in me.

In the Design for Learning Language Pronunciation (LT 539), I had the opportunity to work with another member of the LTS cohort, Madi Collins, in order to design, create, and deliver personalized lessons to Seon-Ha Park, a visiting scholar from South Korea. While only having three available sessions to diagnose her pronunciation errors and provide meaningful lessons to improve upon them, it became quite clear to me the importance of having a strong foundational knowledge of our student(s) and how that interacts with providing effective lessons. For example, knowing that the L1 of our learner was Korean allowed me to prepare for the very high chance that she displayed issues between the articulation of /r/ an /l/, which in turn allowed me to more accurately understand her pronunciation errors from the beginning of our sessions. These sessions and their subsequent reflection model a strong consideration and following of some of the concepts and characteristics found in Brown and Lee’s (2015) description of a successful language teacher. Throughout this experience, the added importance of growth through trial and error was also apparent. While learning all about needs analyses and fulfilling the needs of students is necessary, there must also be considerable time spent doing these processes in order to continue nurturing our teaching skills.

In Second Language Teaching Practice (LT 537), a practicum-based teaching course, I took part in co-teaching an optional course for American English Institute students, titled “Talking with Ducks”. In this course, I displayed my ability to quickly adapt to rapidly changing circumstances (e.g. unclear directions, low attendance, etc.) and to mitigate classroom issues as they arose. This ability to adapt further extended into my final course reflection, which details specific language learning activities that I found beneficial to the student learning process and how I would change them to fit a different skill area. Therefore, this artifact also serves as an example of my flexibility as an educator, not solely in terms of my ability to modify methods of instruction, but additionally my ability to adapt to the changing needs of students.

Finally, within the introduction of my final course design for the Curriculum and Materials Development course (LT 548), I demonstrate a strong ability to incorporate aspects of my own personal teaching philosophy with the goals of a course. While each educator's personal teaching philosophy is bound to vary , I find it pertinent that there are at least some aspects that are less common and set one apart from the rest. Additionally, these personal views should seek to complement the overall learning experience and support the goals of learners, rather than actively fight against them. In the introduction to the course, I outline my reasoning for the organization for the course and the ways in which my personal views on teaching shine through. For example, one key aspect I seek to highlight in my teaching is the humanity behind language learning. While learning a language is fun for some or a necessary tool for others, languages are representative of a people and culture with their own unique history. By stressing this point in the classroom, amongst other aspects of my personal views on language teaching, I am encouraging students to be ambassadors for the culture and language they are studying and to truly immerse themselves into the experience to reap the maximum benefits possible. In stressing this point to students, I am not only setting them up to be successful users of the target language, but also competent and confident members of the speaking community as a whole.

In closing, the processes of teaching, reflection, and modification, comprise an equally important aspect in the role of a language educator as having adequate knowledge. Through repeatedly putting this knowledge to the test by carrying out lesson plans and responding to the dynamic needs of students, I am further expanding my body of knowledge through trial and error. Ultimately, it is this process of trial and error that allows for the creation of effective and promising language instructors that are expertly equipped to not only teach a language, but teach a new way of seeing the world.

Brown, H. D. & Lee. H. (2015). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy (4th edition). Pearson.