Statement of Teaching Philosophy

I have the privilege to have many good teachers and lecturers in my life whom had showed me that teaching can be a satisfying career choice. I also had experienced teachers where the room of improvement is vast. Although I also hold the view that students are managers of their own education and learning (莲之贵, 贵在长于泥池而不染), teachers can often tip the balance between pleasure and pain.

My experiences in a wide range of mentoring and authoritative roles points to the same conclusion - it is possible to be friendly with tutees without losing the fundamental inherent authority. At the same time, I believe that "rank is what you wear; respect is what you earn". Being friendly towards younger siblings/cousins does not reduce my moral authority. Conversely, it often increases it. If teachers are to influence students positively, mutual trust is an ally I cannot miss. As Randy Pausch said in his last lecture, the trust that students will often do the right thing can yield miracles (http://www.cmu.edu/uls/journeys/randy-pausch/index.html).

I believe that students are primarily interested in learning, even though their interests may not coincide with mine. It is then the teacher's task to engage as much as possible. However, the students also have a role to play, to meet half-way. More often than not, the meeting point is closer to the students' end than the lecturers' end, as Stephen Covey says "Seek first to understand, then to be understood".

At the same time, I should not and cannot assume all students to have the same abilities. The same student may have different capabilities in different subjects. Personally, using different areas, I see myself on the entire spectrum - ranging from totally uninterested and almost refuse to be engaged (ball games) to having very low abilities but the lowest of teachers' expectations are too high to meet (drawing and arts) to being interested but insufficient to push myself more (physics) to having absolute interest and totally directing my own learning (molecular biology and computer science). I see many of my friends having this entire spectrum displayed as well, so my example is not unique. My experience as a tutor and pastoral adviser tells me that I have more or less fixed amount of energy for each subject, which has to be divided by the number of students or tutees in that subject. To give everyone air-time, I am naturally drawn towards group mentoring than lecturing to hundreds. I believe that a teacher's responsibility lies in directing and encouraging a student to move towards to end of enthusiasm and self-directed learning no matter how small that move can be and no matter where their starting point is.

Hence, maybe with the exception of the students at the "uninterested and almost refuse to be engaged" end of the spectrum, I believe that students can often direct their learning if given the opportunity and basic resources to do so, as what Lao Tze said more than 3000 years ago, "When the best rulers achieve their purpose, their subjects claim the achievement as their own". Sometimes, by linking difficult concepts or subject matter to something causal or fun is sufficient. Let the students do a lot of thinking, let them hit the wall (expectation failure) before we throw a lifeline.

I believe in providing opportunities to students who wants to help themselves although it can be discouraging when offers are not taken. Nevertheless, I often tell myself - it is the students who bother to seek help or bother to come to class that matters even if it is just only 1 person. As such, I believe in rigorous evaluation of students' assignments whenever my time allows so that they get the best learning for their effort. My experience in co-founding a periodical tells me that anyone with a keyboard can criticise my attempts but it is the people who contributes that matters.

We all hate relatives who love to rack up our past mistakes whenever we did something wrong again. No matter how difficult it is, I will do my utmost not to do the same to students. Nobody is wrong or right forever; our teeth can bite our lips. I believe that when a mistake is made, learn it and go on. As my thesis adviser said to me "I will rather err on the side of generosity".

Besides teaching the students, I believe that teachers can also learn a lot from the students. At the very least, learning how to interact and communicate with teenagers and young adults. Thus, rapport with students must be established and I can only accomplish this in a friendly mood.

In short, my teaching philosophy can be summarized as follows:

1. Building rapport through casual and friendly interactions.

2. Trust that students generally know what is right and what they should do.

3. Provide ample opportunities for students to direct their own learning.

4. When in doubt, err on the side of generosity.

Last edit: 14/8/09