Christian Wilson

Professor Robert L. Shkorupa

EDU 202-3001

28 October 2019

Philosophical Portrait of Myself

From the very moment I stepped into this class, I did not know what to expect. I had

already gone through two and a half semesters worth of classes trying to figure out what my

career path was going to be, and I had changed my major for the third time at this point. If there

was one thing I knew for sure about what I wanted to do, however, it was to be a teacher. I had

already had some experience under my belt, but it felt like I was taking a leap of faith when I

finally came to a decision as to what kind of teacher I wanted to be, especially since I originally

thought I wanted to teach music.

Looking through the syllabus of this course, I figured that the learning environment

would be strict and that there would be a lot of notetaking, but so far it has turned out to be

neither. Walking into class for the first time, I was surprised to see the almost full classroom of

students sitting down, all of them wanting to be teachers. As the session began, it became very

apparent to me that a large portion of the class was discussion based, and the rest of the class

would be filled with watching educational videos about real teachers and their experiences with

teaching, the long history of teaching in the U.S., and we would also see these teachers

experiment with adults and young students alike in order to test a hypothesis on learning and

teaching. Those videos were always particularly interesting because we are able to see exactly

what aspects of teaching works and we are able to see what ethical, professional teachers look
like. Once a video is over, the professor will then ask the class to reflect on what they saw and

we will have a class discussion about the video.

The classroom normally begins with the presentation of multiple case studies, each of

which are assigned to every student in class. A student will present a hypothetical case of a

teacher having to deal with a student, teacher, or admin related issue, they will then list a number

of solutions to deal with the issue at hand, and then the presenter will pick out which of the

solutions they think is the best and try to justify it. The attention will then be extended to the rest

of the class and we will all usually begin having a group discussion.

During these class discussions, the students who are the most confident in what they saw

are the ones who speak up first and as the hands start going up, more and more students start to

join in. I am someone who likes to observe if I don’t have any immediate comments, so as the

rest of the class expresses what they think, I am taking mental notes and listening to what I agree

with and what I disagree with. The last thing I would want to do is to raise my hand and express

an opinion as if I understand everything about teaching or what it means to be a teacher when I

don’t. I will normally share my thoughts only when I am confident that what I’m going to say is

relevant to the conversation or if it adds another layer or perspective to the conversation. I also

would hate to miss out and get distracted from something important that a student or the

professor has to say, so all of my attention will be focused on listening and watching usually. If

there is anything that I have noticed from the way I learn, it is most definitely through visual and

auditory learning. I am able to do this most effectively if I sit back and carefully observe in

whatever the situation may be.

In a way, I have assigned myself a third assignment for my field observations. I have

already completed 2 visits at the school I am observing at and while I am keeping busy with the
assignments that have been given to me, I am watching not just the students, but the teacher as

well in the way they are handling their classroom and the methods in which they teach, but I

have already began to pick apart the things that I agree and disagree with. I am very much an

observer when it comes to learning. On top of that, the style in which I prefer to learn is to listen

carefully to thorough instruction while being shown a model, visual aid, or being shown a visual

representation of the thing I am learning.

This will heavily impact the way in which I like to teach. As someone who has already

been in a position of teaching others several times, I know that I like to give step-by-step

information that is clear and thorough with the help of some kind of visual representation.

Usually in the past, I have used a drawing on a white board map out whatever it is I am

explaining, or I will use my hands and arms to almost act out what I am explaining to paint

imaginary pictures. This just happens to be a tendency of mine. The way this will help my

students because as someone who leans more towards perennialism, mere lecturing is simply not

enough. I would want my students to be able to have assistance in visualizing texts or ideas that

are difficult to understand by just reading or listening to me talk so that they may have a better

grasp of these things. In 5 years, I would hope that I am running a class on my own in classes full

of juniors and seniors, and that I am becoming successful in teaching using the methods of

learning that work for me. Perhaps I will have been teaching for 2 years at this point.