Selena+Myer's+Philosophy

My Teaching Philosophy I am a teacher who respects each student as an individual with their own unique learning style and needs. I strongly believe and respect equality among my students. I strive to seek out and understand their point of view. I often use enthusiasm and humor in my teaching techniques. I desire to inspire confidence and create a learning environment which is open, highly interactive and encourages exploring by my students. I want my students to know it is ok to make mistakes as I feel we all learn from our mistakes. I want my students to know they can ask me anything at any time and if I do not know the answer, we will find out together and then share our new knowledge. I want them to know I value their prior knowledge and I welcome being the learner myself as well. I always stress to them the only “stupid question” is the one that remains unasked. Goals for my students include bring me what you know, let's compare it to what I know and other students know and all learn from each other. May seem difficult, but not so if done in the proper open and interactive environment. I want them to be eager to learn all they can not only from me as their teacher, but from the world around them as well. I want them to feel as if their thoughts and opinions are valuable and useful assets to my teaching. My learning audience thus far has focused on adult learners. I believe each student brings with them experience from life tasks and problems which serve as a great resource for their own and others’ learning. I agree adult learning is motivated from an internal desire to advance knowledge of a subject and arises from curiosity. I strive to create a relaxed and safe learning environment in order to lessen the adult’s fear of failure. This represents the Constructivist theory. My teaching so far has been mostly in the hospital. I am a charge nurse on a busy Med-Surg unit and I teach daily to my patients while in the hospital as well as at discharge. I have taught a few classes over the years such as continuing education type classes. I have been a Clinical Instructor for GCSU for 4 semesters now. I want to get my Nurse Educator degree so I can teach in the classroom as well as the clinical setting. I will always be a student myself as I strive to stay on top of new material in order to be thorough in my teaching.