philosophy of health position
sam1992
statement_of_teaching_philosophy_1.docxStatement of Teaching Philosophy—Natalie K. DeWitt
I am drawn to the rewards and challenges of teaching because I value the opportunities teachers have to contribute to the intellectual growth of their students. We all have memories of those teachers who were most influential in our lives; mine is of a health teacher who used a black light and special lotion to show me how germ-covered my hands still were after I washed them what I thought was really, really well. We remember these teachers because they made a lasting impression on the way in which we view the world, and I strive to be that teacher for my students.
Approach
My objectives for student learning are short and long term in nature. I set objectives for the end of each lesson that link back to overall course objectives that are skill, knowledge, and attitude-based. At the beginning of each course, it is important to evaluate students’ prior skills, knowledge, and attitudes towards a class topic before jumping into the material. In order to properly assess learning outcomes, teachers must know where there students are before they can measure how far they will go. Before introducing a new topic, I conduct an in-class activity to elicit my students’ prior knowledge and beliefs about the new subject, asking them daily to determine what my class has to offer. If a student can connect how each lesson is personally relevant, it can contribute to the ways in which a student constructs and retains new information.
I believe that the most meaningful learning occurs in an environment that encourages supervised exploration into realistic settings. In order for situated learning to occur, the learner must be given access to an environment in which the knowledge and skills that are being taught can be referenced and experienced. For example, in my Consumer Health course, I dedicate three to four class sessions to health insurance and provide an update to the current status of health insurance in the United States, and how our programs compare to other countries around the world. To begin the lesson, I provide students with a scenario in which they were injured and would need to know details about their current insurance coverage, and ask them to answer a series of questions about their current health insurance coverage. Ultimately, few students can answer any of the questions. This activity both introduces the topic to be taught, and provides me with information about my students’ prior knowledge about their health insurance coverage. After lecture and other activities, students are given more questions about health insurance and are asked to investigate their current coverage. Finally, students complete a short reflection paper based on the information they found about their policies and discuss which of the types of health care they would like to see implemented into the US health care system. This assignment is knowledge and skills based by design and serves to help students developed an informed opinion on healthcare in the US.
Practice
Each classroom offers to me a unique set of challenges that cause me to adapt and change to that environment. Acknowledging that what works for one class might not work for the next has been especially helpful in preventing me from making assumptions about my students and their needs.
During my teaching experiences as an associate instructor in Applied Health Science, I carefully chose readings for their relevance and readability for each class. I believe making readings, assignments, and activities as fresh, current and pertinent as possible helps a student connect to their classroom experiences and helps to curtail frustration and boredom. Fostering critical reading and discussion skills transverses disciplines—they are skills that can be used on a daily basis, in every field of study, in every occupation. Gaining knowledge by memorizing statements within a text does not indicate understanding; it is merely a distinction between memorizing and regurgitating facts instead of interpreting those facts into the many stories they can tell.
Being an instructor that fosters the development of critical reading and thinking skills has its difficulties (more lengthy assignments to grade, more time and effort involved in teaching skills over facts), but these are difficulties that are rewarding to take on, most memorably so when a student discusses and interpretation of a text or makes an argument that I had not previously considered. Teaching critical reading and thinking skills enables students to view the world with a healthy dose of skepticism; to question, test, and analyze all that they hear, see and read. Most of all, it is a challenge for most students, and it is my responsibility as an instructor to address the developmental needs of my students and encourage them to engage in their educations by playing up to their strengths, and working on what needs strengthened.
Goals
My goal as an educator is to develop students’ knowledge and skills related to a variety of health topics. A centralizing theme to every course that I teach is the development of independent, critical thinking skills. Whether I am preparing education students for their secondary health classrooms or lecturing about personal health to a sophomore business school student, my goal is to empower students to visualize health and wellness as a process of asking difficult questions and honing the skills required to answer those questions. When students leave my classes, they will have the ability to find and communicate accurate and evidence-based health information and apply it to their own lives and the lives of others. The ability to communicate accurate health information that is sensitive to people’s needs, feelings, and goals is a skill that I work on with all my students through classroom activities and performance-based assessment.
As a teacher, it is up to me to provide my students with the most accurate portrait of a given subject so that they may make the most informed decision possible in regards to their own health and wellness. Each method I use to teach course content is strictly tailored to the students’ needs and the messages I wish to communicate. I offer my students a variety of assessments in my courses, including projects, tests, quizzes, papers, and journals, allowing students to choose one type of assessment over another on at least one assignment per semester. Having this option offers students a sense of control and ownership in a semi-democratic classroom atmosphere.
