Educational Philosophy

A good teacher cannot begin or continue without being a learner. One could never put a price on experience and proper education. As Romain Rolland said, “If a man is to shed a light of the sun upon other man, he must first of all have it within himself.” Young students deserve educators and mentors who are masters of their own field equipped with better and higher understanding. As I shifted my work from a routine hospital setting to an academic career as a Clinical Instructor of Bachelor of Medical Technology, I’ve realized that being in academe is way different and harder. In a hospital work experience, if your shift is done so does is your work. However, in an academic environment, one should invest a lot of his time; have to be knowledgeable of all the basic theories related to the course syllabus; and most especially to learn how to be sensitive to the needs and shortcomings of his students. While being a master in ones content is obligatory, if one does not understand how to best communicate one’s knowledge to his students then the expertise is useless.

My role as a Clinical Instructor includes evaluating interns during their duty hours, conducting lectures, small group discussions and practical work-ups. It is challenging to create real world connections in the classrooms while producing a student-centered learning environment. If students do not believe that they can use your lessons in the future, they will see it as insignificant and pointless. I’ve learned that a good educator must understand that every individual is unique and they will vary on their thoughts and actions. It is our job to often examine our teaching methods and find new ones. In this constantly changing world where our students live, we must also be a student and immerse ourselves in the society. We must know first-hand how to handle our student to effectively relay good understanding of our lessons, it is the necessity to create a meaningful learning environment and to understand how to relate ones knowledge to our students.

I always believe in fostering independent critical thinking skills. Memorization is not always learning because learning requires thinking. The greatest gift an educator can give to his students is helping them to be motivated to think, to learn more and to thirst for greater knowledge. To be able to critically think is an invaluable skill to anyone. A person with a good memory is not necessarily good at critical thinking. One of the prime lessons I’ve learned from my mentors was to able to deduce consequences from what I know and to engage in identifying the relevance and importance of these ideas. They’ve influenced me not to settle for less and to always think outside of the box. Furthermore, they did more than just aid in my intellectual development; they were exemplary teachers because they looked at me with utmost confidence and believed in me more than I believe myself. They set an excellent example for me to follow as a great teacher.

According to the book, The Teaching Profession, “Philosophy is the window and compass of a teacher in her teaching profession” My educational philosophy is to give students opportunity to gain first-hand experience of the course and to relate in real social problems such as of how to improve quality of life. As what I have greatly learned from my mentors I would like also to pass on to my students the notion of not settling for ‘what is’ but rather to dream about ‘what might be’. I prefer actual experimentation and assessing each student of their critical thinking by conducting small group discussions, requiring reflection papers, comprehensive exams both practical and written. Reconstructionism fits to my educational philosophy; by the same token, we as educators should strive to create meaningful classroom environment for our students to promote lifelong learning because our dedication to teach them rightly by becoming a part of their lives will help to change the course of history and of the future.