My teaching philosophy follows closely from my creativity research, insofar as I encourage students to consider elements of both novelty and utility when learning new information. I have found that, in developing awareness of an idea’s unfamiliarity and its usefulness, individuals can strip away black-and-white mindsets and more easily integrate difficult information. This philosophy draws on my own complex upbringing, one that intersected multiple racial identities, ethnicities, and cultural traditions. As a mixed and French-speaking child in Arkansas, I realized that my peers and neighbors were often unfamiliar with entire facets of my identity. Yet, instead of hiding these traits, I was motivated to demonstrate the utility that a new perspective like my families’ could bring to society. What previously evoked cognitive dissonance actually helped individuals––including myself––to engage in critical thinking and generate a more-holistic perspective of the world. When this creativity approach is translated into the classroom, not only does it permit me to discuss my own scholarship, but more importantly, I have found that it encourages student curiosity and engagement among several fields of study.
I have taught across multiple domains and institutions which has helped me refine a well-informed practice to pedagogy. As early as sophomore year of my undergraduate program at the University of Arkansas, my stellar coursework in both my mathematics and psychology majors resulted in an invitation to serve as a teaching assistant (TA) for Introduction to Statistics for Psychologists, a required course for individuals pursuing a psychology degree. Because this class was often students’ first time merging principles across different domains, my ultimate goal in the discussion sections that I led was to facilitate interdisciplinary thinking. In practice, I demonstrated how quantitative principles could complement psychological constructs by guiding my ~15 students through weekly worksheets, reviewing lecture materials, and completing short mathematical proofs and formula derivations. Although by this time I was also employed by the mathematics department to grade assignments for other courses, serving as a TA for Statistics for Psychologists offered my first applied opportunity in teaching and introducing students to integrative ways of thinking about the world. This experience inspired me to seek additional avenues where I could hone these teaching skills further.
I matriculated to Duke University for my doctoral degree, which when paired with the university’s Certificate for College Teaching program, led me to grow as a teacher and a lecturer. For instance, I had the pleasure to serve as a lecturing TA for Cognitive Psychology, a 100-person undergraduate course with four discussion sections, two of which I was the sole instructor (TA rating: 4.54/5.00). In my lectures, I assembled weekly presentation slides that leveraged diverse learning methods like cognitive psychology demos, real-world examples and videos, and Jeopardy-themed review sessions. In addition, I curated a collaborative curriculum wherein students completed group presentations on assigned articles, and posted weekly discussion questions and paper summaries on online forums. In the semesters following, I translated this multimethod approach to my subsequent teaching positions at Duke. As a TA for Forensic Psychology (course rating: 4.33/5.00), I sharpened my skills related to administrative duties, including programming online assessments, evaluating weekly reflections and upwards of 150 essays, book-keeping grades and attendance for the 82 students, and generally serving as a liaison between student and professor. The following semester, I assisted in a Psychology of Imagination course cross-listed between both graduate and undergraduate students (TA rating: 5.00/5.00). In this seminar-based class, while I would perform logistical duties like programming online resources, I found the most passion in working directly with the students. Specifically, I guided weekly discussions on articles relating to imagination, delivered lectures about creativity, and worked one-on-one with each of the 15 students throughout the semester to help them craft a final essay that showcased the role of imagination in their own academic disciplines. Ultimately, my success as a teaching assistant across courses at Duke has earned me the praise of both my students and my department, as I was described by a faculty member as “among the best TAs to date.”
While holding these positions, I was also enrolled in Duke’s aforementioned Certificate for College Teaching as a way to receive direct guidance on my teaching skills. For example, one component of the certificate included being shadowed by fellow graduate students who would provide personalized feedback across multiple of my lectures. As part of the certificate, I also enrolled in pedagogy classes, including Teaching Diverse Learners and Visual Communication. Both equipped me with extremely helpful tools considerate of today’s diverse and technological academic environment. As an example, I now accommodate learners with varying hearing levels by programming PowerPoint lectures to show real-time subtitles as I speak in large lecture halls. In part attributed to these practical skills, my classroom environments have proven to be inclusive, as I have been described in student evaluations as “very patient and kind,” “welcoming,” and “open to any questions.” In one statement that I was especially touched to receive, a student expressed that I “left time in class to discuss any issues or concerns [the students] had” and that “leaving it up to the students to voice things like that while not being ignorant to any identities or issues is as inclusive and welcoming as you can get.”
Past instruction:
Introduction to Statistics for Psychologists, Drill Section Instructor (University of Arkansas). 15 students.
Transition to Advanced Mathematics, Grader (University of Arkansas). 20 students in each of two semesters.
Cognitive Psychology, General TA and Discussion Sections Instructor (Duke University). 50 students directly taught, 100 total class students. See syllabus I developed here.
Cognitive Neuroscience Colloquia, Organizer and Instructor (Duke University). 15-20 students in each of two semesters.
Forensic Psychology, General TA (Duke University). 82 students.
Psychology of Imagination, General TA (Duke University). 15 total undergraduate and graduate students.
My approach to teaching emphasizes creative thinking. This is not to say that I tell students to think in odd or atypical manners (though this mindset can certainly be beneficial at times). Rather, I prompt students to determine both the novel components of the information (including a metacognitive awareness of this novelty) and the usefulness in learning the information. In establishing this multi-layered structure to learning, students can hold a stronger grasp of the knowledge, as elaborated below.
Novelty. Learning is, by definition, a novel experience. Yet how we integrate new information into existing knowledge can be facilitated by the educator. For this reason, I am very intentional in intervening on this process by highlighting the level of “newness” of an unfamiliar idea. A significant reason to explicate novelty is that other learning mechanisms strongly relate to the familiarity levels of a concept. For example, students may feel more anxious to learn something highly unfamiliar, which in turn may dissuade them from approaching the topic. An awareness of this relationship can better inform the student of their own learning practices.
One way to incorporate teaching practices that target novelty is having students undermine the purported novelty of a concept by reframing it in familiar manners (which, following from above, motivates them to approach the information). For example, when I taught lessons of creativity psychology during Psychology of Imagination, I would discuss abstract, theoretical frameworks of creativity. While these models may initially be unfamiliar to students, I grounded such principles into applied and relatable (i.e., less novel) exemplars, like making art or coming up with unique ways to save money in college. In addition, as mentioned, I helped each student in this course (considerate of their own background and expertise) craft a final essay that related imagination to their own area of study. By promoting these self-relevant connections and framing novelty as a subjective judgment relative to each student, they were able to approach the material in a tailored and more-passionate fashion. As a result, students wrote incredible essays on the role of imagination in topics like mental health, religion, and even rowing.
Utility. Inherent in my teaching are also principles of personal utility. On one level, I believe that students should understand the impact and importance of the content they are learning in order to provide a richness to an otherwise shallow learning experience. This can include, once again, making personal connections with the material or showcasing translations of the material to applied settings like health. Of course, this engagement will vary by topic and student preferences. Given this variability, I try to adjust my own levels of energy (including use of humor) when teaching so as to encourage students to engage with the material more and draw these values of impact.
On a broader level, I also incorporate notions of utility in my course design, leveraging different assignment types to curate essential (i.e., useful) skills in the hopes that they can be transferred to other domains, including in the students’ future careers. For example, my students practice their writing skills through essay assignments, learn to collaborate via group-based projects, and engage with remote work settings via online discussion forums. It is also in this sphere where I have contemplated the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in education, as these technologies question what skills are even useful for students to know in the real world. Because my own research demonstrates that human ability is still practically significant even in collaboration with AI technologies,1 I still promote manual critical thinking skills in the form of, for instance, in-class assignments. However, my future pedagogy will certainly evolve in line with developments of AI.
Novelty x Utility. Lastly, the combination of novelty and utility inform my teaching practices as well. Also revealed in my research, sometimes concepts that are too novel can lead to drops in personal utility,2 which when translated to pedagogy, suggests that information cannot be suddenly too new without losing a sense of impact. Instead, lectures should be organized in a gradual, stepwise design that builds upon itself, constantly relating the unfamiliar back to the newly learned. However, my work also shows that individual differences––including personality and mental health levels––modulate this relationship between novelty and usefulness, demanding a tailored and personalized approach to teaching that I endorse.
1 Orwig, Bellaiche et al., 2024 (Creativity Research Journal)
2 Bellaiche, Smoski, & LaBar (in prep)
"Lucas was very open to any questions I had and facilitated our discussions with passion and creativity. I really enjoyed his presentations and he did a really good job explaining all of the articles we read."
"A very supportive and kind TA! The discussion sections had a relaxed but organized structure. He was always very prepared with presentations. He also was very flexible with setting aside time to meet with me for Office Hours and answer all my questions."
"Lucas was a great TA and very passionate about his own research. I enjoyed coming to discussion and working in small groups to have further conversations on the content we were learning in lecture. I think the icebreaker on the first day was very fun and overall enjoyed my time."
The foregoing discussions directly translate to my mentorship practices as well, which I view as a more applied teaching environment. In team-based contexts as these, I meticulously teach my mentees about each stage of the research process, from idea generation to dissemination. In fact, by nature of the research process, I find it easier to demonstrate the principles of novelty and utility in this form of teaching: these students are designing paradigms aimed to uncover inherently new information that serves some translatable purpose to mental health. In total, throughout my doctoral program I have directly mentored seven undergraduate students through a variety of projects relating to creativity. Of these students, I have overseen successful honors theses or independent study projects for three, published in top journals with three, and presented at multiple international conferences with one. Because these research processes can simultaneously entail frustrating, exciting, boring, and impactful moments, I find that I develop unique bonds with these students such that I stay in touch with them years later to learn about their career developments. For example, my students are currently in positions at law school, medical school, and as a psychology lab manager as Princeton University.
One final and important aspect to my mentorship philosophy is curating a research team across a diversity of backgrounds and education levels, such that each member can learn from one another. For example, one notable project that I directed comprised of three stellar undergraduate students across majors (e.g., visual arts, public health, biology) and multiple faculty advisors. Given this breadth in experience, we were awarded a local grant that supports interdisciplinary research teams which we used to pay participants, buy equipment, and go out to dinner to celebrate the paper’s publication.3 In the future, I intend to continue these mentorship practices in the hopes of not only guiding the next generation of scholars where I can, but also to personally learn from them.
3 Bellaiche et al., 2025 (iScience)