Teaching Philosophy
I consider my community of learners to be anyone wanting or needing to learn what I have to teach; that can be in a classroom, in a workshop, in counseling a client, in supervising a new counselor, or in teaching my children and grandchildren. People learn in different ways. Some learn by taking notes; some learn by listening to a lecture; some learn by seeing visual representations of the material; some learn by performing the activity. My teaching style needs to encompass as many of these methods as possible. Assessment of learning should accommodate these differences as well.
Over the years, I have taught several workshops and classes. My perspective on teaching combines my experiences as a learner, knowing how I learn best, and as a teacher, knowing what I want my students to learn. Additionally, I want both sides to enjoy what they are doing. I learn best through visual cues and experiential learning, and I retain information best when it is exciting and personal to me. So, in teaching, I try to incorporate those aspects into the lessons. For example, the first workshop I taught for a conference was on stress and pain management. In counseling, I developed my own method of testing out several pain management strategies to determine which was most effective for the individual client. In the workshop, I gave the counselors the opportunity to experience pain management strategies for themselves. The information was also presented to them on PowerPoint slides and handouts to replicate on their own. In my first classroom teaching experience, I wanted to take that process further. My goal was to do something experiential or personal once or twice in an hour class to keep students engaged; not just experiential, but fun as well. Learning is more valuable when it is fun. The students may not have the exact definition of fun as I do, but if I am having fun teaching, they are more likely to have a positive experience. So, in each class I teach, I attempt to include an activity or a story that displays the information in a practical and interesting way.
My role as a counselor educator is to process information and present it in a way that the majority of the students are able to understand and assimilate. Because of this approach, diverse students do not have trouble being successful in my classes. When students are able to see the relationship between their own lives and the educational material, they can then begin to synthesize it to the situations of their clients. In the classroom experience, attention is given to any and all who have questions. Individual attention is paid to those needing more focused care.
Teaching practicum and internship are altogether different experiences. Many classes and sources of information must be brought together in one place to conduct clinical counseling. Ethics must be conveyed in the form of the informed consent. Theories of counseling and basic skills are reviewed as the students begin relationship-building and counseling techniques with their clients. Abnormal psychology and assessment are used in treatment planning. With so much information to assimilate and begin utilizing, students are frequently anxious and overwhelmed. As a supervisor, it works best when I help normalize their anxiety, give them clear expectations and guidelines, and then provide appropriate guidance and encouragement of their strengths. If students can learn the skills of relationship building and reflecting content, affect, and meaning, they have a strong foundation on which to build their counseling practices.
