Over the course of seven years in the field instructional development, I have taught undergraduate student and professional courses of aviation and obtained their feedback to improve my teaching methodology. I also undertook revision of undergraduate syllabus based on inputs from various agencies. During this process I have learnt that teaching is learning from multiple perspective and while teaching the central focus should be student learning. Hence, I have evolved my teaching philosophy based on four aspects: interactively teaching, creative thinking, providing resources used for teaching and supporting a wide diversity of students.
I am a proponent of active learning and use a variety of methods to encourage discussion …show more content…
A typical University of Massachusetts undergraduate takes 4-5 courses and with 5-10 hours weekly extracurricular activities, which do not leave them much drive for spontaneous after-class reading and digesting. Hence I provide a lot of study materials on course website like power point presentation, excel sheet used to solve problem in the class and other relevant articles that they need throughout the course. I also realize that at times the students do miss out or misinterpret some aspects in class and hence I provide them video of all my lectures for reference. I meticulously prepare quiz and homework with objective and subjective answers respectively for all the chapters to assess their assimilation. I encourage students to attempt quiz and homework immediately after the completion of the chapter and discuss in the next class in case of any problem. After attempting quiz and submission of the homework, I provide them with model answers. After assessing their homework, a detailed feedback of their performance is provided to help them understand the concept. I also provide them with practice test to stimulate their mind and prepare them for the …show more content…
So in order to know the backgrounds of my students, I would generally ask the students to answer a simple survey about their background and expectation. During the first class, I also clearly explain the prerequisites of the class and what I expect from the students in each week and over the semester. I always encourage students to come and talk with me if they are uncertain about taking the course and try to help them choose the right course. I put in a lot of effort to resolve students’ questions and confusions in the class itself or immediately after each lecture, but I do understand that some students will not be able to grasp everything taught in the class. To overcome this problem and to provide personal attention to the students in need I hold my office hours three days in week. I encourage students to see me during office hours. This way has resulted in some really in-depth discussion about the lecture materials. In our time, email has become a major way of information exchange. I try my best to reply to students’ emails as soon as possible so that they know I am reachable outside classroom when they want to study statistics and encounter some