Good Example Of Teaching Philosophy Essay

The Role of the Teacher

The question ‘what is the list of good teacher’s qualities?’ cannot be answered easily. A ‘good teacher’ does not always mean ‘good teaching’. Although an individual may have the right beliefs, great competencies, and an inspirational mission and self, the environment may significantly limit his or her behavior. Ideally, there is a complete levels ‘alignment’ that means that the competencies, behavior, beliefs, mission and identity of the teacher together help him match the environment. The ideal teacher needs to have the following qualities: a strong self-worth sense, feelings of respect and love for people, and a great hunger for knowledge and truth (Korthagen, 2004). However, some people suppose that the teacher should be strict, demanding and authoritative. Such viewpoints have a right for existence, but in my opinion, they do not contribute much to the effective teaching.
In my opinion, the main task of the teacher is to make a child willing to learn and help him to discover and develop his talent and creativity. Nowadays, the world around us is changing rapidly and everybody is aware that it is not enough to use only knowledge received in school, college or university. It is extremely important to be able to change, to learn new things and to have up-to-date knowledge. Now it is related to almost all industries and professions, especially IT, engineering, technology, medicine, and many others. This all is possible only when the person knows how to learn new things himself. Students should learn how and where to get new knowledge, to identify what kind of knowledge do they need and how to use creative approach to learning. This all is highly appreciated in the changing modern environment and will definitely be helpful for achieving personal goals in the future life. Many teachers prefer not to develop creativity and learning skills in their students. They usually ask students to retell the material from the book close to the text. In case the student adds something to it, it is not approved and is considered to be wrong.
According to HARDEN & CROSBY (2000), the teacher can play the following role at school: the teacher as the provider of information; role model; a facilitator; an assessor; a planner, and a resource developer. In my opinion, the most important role is ‘learning facilitator” as it corresponds to my teaching philosophy. The teacher is no longer seen mainly as an information dispenser or tape recorder, but as a manager or facilitator of the students’ studying. The more freedom and responsibility given to the learner, the bigger the change required in the role of the teacher. The beginning of problem-based learning with a following substantial change in the teacher-student relationship has lead to the change in the teacher’s role from the provider of information to the facilitator. The role of the teacher is not only to inform the learners but to facilitate and encourage them to study themselves (HARDEN & CROSBY, 2000).
Regarding the personal qualities, I think, it is important that the teacher likes his work and students and is willing to help them to study and develop. Not all teachers have the same point of view. For instance, many teachers focus on themselves initially (what other people think about them and their skills of classroom control) and only sometimes on students’ learning. Another kind of teachers need long time to change from a self focus to a students’ focus. Also there are teachers that never attend learning of students, that do not tend to change their teaching methods if their students do not study and that do not know what they can do if it is difficult to learn for students (Darling-Hammond & Baratz-Snowden, 2007).
Ideally, all the teachers should be concentrated on their students’ learning process, helping and encouraging them. Even in case the student has poor knowledge, does not do homework, etc., the good teacher should know how to make him learn. In this case the individual approach is necessary as not all children have the same opinion and background and teacher needs to explain them the necessity of learning and its advantages for the future life.

Teaching Methods and Effectiveness

There are various methods of teaching that may be effective or not. While choosing the methods it is necessary to take into account many factors, such as the subject, students’ age and background, expected results, curriculum, etc. However, there are no right methods that do not encourage the student’s creativity and hunger for knowledge. When the teacher asks students, for instance, to learn everything by heart, it does not develop the creativity and moreover, such things can be forgotten very quickly. Information learned by the child during his creative work, e.g. searching in the library or group project, is easier to remember.
The most appropriate criterion for good teaching measuring is the student learning amount that takes place. Effective teaching is the situations’ creation in which learning occurs and producing such situations is what successful teachers do effectively (Sajjad, n.d.). The students of the good teacher are usually interested in the subject, willing to discover more information than foreseen by the curriculum, ask questions during the lesson, etc. There should be no students who do not know the subject at all. Depending on the individual capabilities, they should have an appropriate amount of knowledge regarding the subject. The task of the teacher is to provide necessary help for each learner in order to achieve best possible results.
Conclusions

References

Darling-Hammond, L., & Baratz-Snowden, J. (2007). A Good Teacher in Every Classroom: Preparing the Highly Qualified Teachers Our Children Deserve. Educational HORIZONS, 116. Retrieved from http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ750647.pdf
HARDEN, R., & CROSBY, J. (2000). The good teacher is more than a lecturer: the twelve roles of the teacher. Medical Teacher, 22(4), 336-339. Retrieved from http://njms.rutgers.edu/education/office_education/community_preceptorship/documents/TheGoodTeacher.pdf
Korthagen, F. (2004). In search of the essence of a good teacher: towards a more holistic approach in teacher education. Teaching And Teacher Education, 20, 77-97. doi:10.1016/j.tate.2003.10.002
Sajjad, S. EFFECTIVE TEACHING METHODS AT HIGHER EDUCATION LEVEL. University Of Karachi, 1-13. Retrieved from http://class.web.nthu.edu.tw/ezfiles/669/1669/img/1381/1.Effectiveteachingmethodsathighereducationlevel.pdf