Teaching Philosophy
“The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.” - William A. Ward
As the quote suggests, teaching involves four elements: telling, explaining, demonstrating and inspiring, all of which create an active and experiential learning environment.
It is the teachers’ responsibility to create a supportive learning environment so that students feel comfortable asking questions, identifying misunderstandings, challenging material, and demonstrating how they would conceptualize material in their own way. To create such an environment, I make myself available and approachable, and I demonstrate genuine care and concern for each individual student.
Like teaching, learning also involves four elements: retention, reflection, application and critical thinking.
Although each of these elements is critical to learning, students vary in how they learn such that some elements may be engaged in more than others. Together, however, these elements of teaching and learning are the foundation for understanding, remembering and applying course materials.
- Through telling, I use lectures to impart knowledge to students in a way that is logical and easy to understand.
- Through explaining, I use lectures and out-of-class opportunities to facilitate students’ learning by explaining course material, clarifying and reinforcing students’ understanding, and encouraging students to conceptualize course material in their own way.
- Through demonstration, I provide students with case studies and real-world current examples of course material as well as highlight how material is relevant to the student; in so doing, students become engaged and excited about course material.
- Though inspiration, I motivate students to apply material to real-world organizational situations and problems, create effective solutions to these problems, and critically think about course material.
It is the teachers’ responsibility to create a supportive learning environment so that students feel comfortable asking questions, identifying misunderstandings, challenging material, and demonstrating how they would conceptualize material in their own way. To create such an environment, I make myself available and approachable, and I demonstrate genuine care and concern for each individual student.
Like teaching, learning also involves four elements: retention, reflection, application and critical thinking.
- Through retention, students read course material thoroughly and listen to the teacher explain material during lectures, such that material is understood at a fundamental level.
- Once material is retained, students reflect on material by thinking about what it means to them, how they would conceptualize it in their own way and examples they would use to illustrate the material. It is through reflection that students begin to understand, rather than merely memorize course material.
- Through application, students think about how material is relevant to them, and apply course material to real-world organizational problems to create effective solutions.
- Through critical thinking, students engage with problems by considering both sides of the issue, challenge the value, accuracy, and applicability of the material in real life organizational settings, and build connections with previously learned concepts.
Although each of these elements is critical to learning, students vary in how they learn such that some elements may be engaged in more than others. Together, however, these elements of teaching and learning are the foundation for understanding, remembering and applying course materials.
Teaching Strategies
The teaching strategies that I choose to use reflect the four elements of my teaching philosophy—telling, explaining, demonstrating and inspiring.
Telling: I use lectures and power point presentations to synthesize material and present it in a logical and understandable way. I also develop and disseminate handouts that summarize difficult course material in a simplified manner.
Explaining: I use lectures to relate material to students and answer questions. To provide a deeper understanding, I encourage students to conceptualize and categorize material in their own way. I use the white board to break down difficult concepts by defining and categorizing them.
Demonstrating: I emphasize the applicability of course concepts to students as future employees and managers by providing examples of the relevance of course concepts. I also use current events, video clips, guest speakers from industry, and case studies to exemplify concepts.
Inspiring: I motivate students to think critically about material and examples I have provided, and to apply course concepts to effectively solve organizational problems depicted in the current events, video clips and case studies.
To provide a supportive learning environment, I show genuine concern for, and interest in students. I continuously ask for students’ feedback about course material and the structure of the course. I frequently remind students that I am available outside of class to discuss course material.
Telling: I use lectures and power point presentations to synthesize material and present it in a logical and understandable way. I also develop and disseminate handouts that summarize difficult course material in a simplified manner.
Explaining: I use lectures to relate material to students and answer questions. To provide a deeper understanding, I encourage students to conceptualize and categorize material in their own way. I use the white board to break down difficult concepts by defining and categorizing them.
Demonstrating: I emphasize the applicability of course concepts to students as future employees and managers by providing examples of the relevance of course concepts. I also use current events, video clips, guest speakers from industry, and case studies to exemplify concepts.
Inspiring: I motivate students to think critically about material and examples I have provided, and to apply course concepts to effectively solve organizational problems depicted in the current events, video clips and case studies.
To provide a supportive learning environment, I show genuine concern for, and interest in students. I continuously ask for students’ feedback about course material and the structure of the course. I frequently remind students that I am available outside of class to discuss course material.
Courses Taught
MOS 3342A: Compensation and Benefits Management
Teaching Activities: The overall objective of this course is to provide students with an understanding of how organizations use the Total Compensation Model to create strategic compensation and rewards systems. Since this course is heavily focused on the methods used to make compensation related decisions, I have created several in class activities that require students to engage in different aspects of the Total Compensation Model. I also use ample organizational examples of the Total Compensation Model and assign research journal articles as required readings to provide empirical evidence of the effectiveness of this model. I also use video clips to engage students with course content.
MOS 3385B: Essentials of Human Resource Management for Non-HR Students
Teaching Activities: In this elective course, I provide an overview of the main HRM principles and practices (e.g., job analysis and design, recruitment and selection, training and development, performance management, compensation, etc) and how the legal framework (i.e., statutory and contractual laws) in Canada impacts personnel management. To do so, I use current events as examples, engage students in case study analyses, develop class activities that require students to apply course concepts and show video case examples to which students apply course material. I also stress the importance of HRM to organizations, managers and employees, thereby instilling an appreciation of HRM functions in non-HR students.
Teaching Activities: The overall objective of this course is to provide students with an understanding of how organizations use the Total Compensation Model to create strategic compensation and rewards systems. Since this course is heavily focused on the methods used to make compensation related decisions, I have created several in class activities that require students to engage in different aspects of the Total Compensation Model. I also use ample organizational examples of the Total Compensation Model and assign research journal articles as required readings to provide empirical evidence of the effectiveness of this model. I also use video clips to engage students with course content.
MOS 3385B: Essentials of Human Resource Management for Non-HR Students
Teaching Activities: In this elective course, I provide an overview of the main HRM principles and practices (e.g., job analysis and design, recruitment and selection, training and development, performance management, compensation, etc) and how the legal framework (i.e., statutory and contractual laws) in Canada impacts personnel management. To do so, I use current events as examples, engage students in case study analyses, develop class activities that require students to apply course concepts and show video case examples to which students apply course material. I also stress the importance of HRM to organizations, managers and employees, thereby instilling an appreciation of HRM functions in non-HR students.
