Introduction
I started my career as an academician in University Teknologi Malaysia since 2014. Since then, I have fallen in love with teaching. I would have to say that I am very passionate in teaching as I believe that it gives me the ability to make an impact – no matter how little – to the students – who is part of the society. As Jerry Whittle said, “To teach is to touch a life forever”. Hence, this responsibility makes me more eager to learn more on the best practices of teaching and learning; and to keep on constantly improve my skills in teaching. I believe that as an educator, we should always keep updating ourselves with the most recent teaching and learning techniques and we should never stop learning. In fact, we are facing a different kind of generations nowadays, with a completely different style and attitudes than the previous generations. Not keeping abreast with the current updates on the best practices would mean our teaching would probably be no longer efficient to the new generations of students and would hinder their learning. Therefore, I will keep on seeking new teaching skills and updating my teaching styles from time to time accordingly.
Teaching Philosophy
“Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten” – Frederic Skinner. I truly believe that as an educator, the focus should be holistic, not only on finishing the syllabus. I believe in giving my all while teaching. Ensuring that every aspect of students is being considered at. In each class, I do focus on my student emotions, motivation and well-being. A positive environment makes the learning enjoyable. The first thing I would do in class is to ask my students how they are feeling that day. I would start by asking how was their day, are they feeling well, or are they tired and stressed? Depending on the answers, I would do a short two to three minutes pep talk, injecting some jokes, or just conduct a simple energizer activity to enhance the mood of the students. Once everyone has started to smile and laugh, I will start with the class. I have done this routine from the day I started teaching.
I always use variety of teaching and learning method to ensure the students are engaged throughout the class. In which, the class is divided into a sub session that include few different teaching and learning activities to enhance students’ learning. During the COVID-19 pandemic, classes have to be shift online. Hence, I have to change the way I teach to ensure students can cope with the fully online learning. To aid students with internet difficulties and connection instability, I would include a mixed of asynchronous and synchronous session. This helps the students to be fully involved with the learning process with no one left behind.
As I have 14 years of experience working in the industry before entering the academic world, I have always made sure that I do share some of my experience with the students. I think it is important for students to understand not only the theories, but also the practical aspects of everything they learnt. So, that they could relate it to the real world and apply it later in life. Aside from that, I have always included some extra sharing on things that matters in life. I would teach students about values in life, ethics and integrity, the importance of being kind, considerate and ensuring that we become a better person. As all these values do matter in life. I believe in inspiring and educating students to become a better person that will contribute to the society, even in their own small ways.
I believed that these teaching and learning strategies do help my students to learn better and at the same time, enjoyed the learning process. As my aim is to make the class as fun and enjoyable as possible for the students, while ensuring the learning does occur. So that, when they leave the class, they leave with a smile on their face. Based on the students’ feedback, one of the common comments I received from my students are that they enjoyed my class and are not bored during the class. With this feedback, I do believe that I have succeeded in achieving my teaching philosophy.
