Teaching Philosophy
My teaching philosophy has been shaped by my experience from both the corporate environment where I spent 7 years in a managerial role training new employees and in the formal academic context. In my managerial role, I was responsible for both training and guiding new employees and in the academic setting, I have focused on education and research in second language acquisition (SLA). As I supervised new employees as their trainer, I started to realize how different each trainee was in terms of the speed and the style of learning. Understanding that everyone can be uniquely different in the process of learning has helped me tremendously value individual differences while teaching at the CLP (community language program) class at Teachers College (TC), Columbia University. Also, the knowledge about SLA acquired through the instructions offered at TC, such as Introduction to SLA and SLA in the classroom, has enabled me to combine my own teaching/training experience and the theories in SLA; that is, what type of corrective feedback is more effective, what difference the first language (L1) background makes in the processes of learning English, how input is processed throughout the classroom instruction by the learner, and so forth.
My personal belief about teaching is reflected in what I teach, how I teach it, and how I can potentially tap into a student's motivation as well as being aware of each student’s cultural background. The integrated skills I have taught in class include speaking skill, listening skill, writing skill, and reading skill in English communications. Since the main goal of the CLP program is to serve as a means for students to improve their communicative skills, which is required on a daily basis to live comfortably in NYC, I strive to provide students with balanced instructions in the four skills even after completion of the program. In addition, my personal belief that motivation is a key for more successful language learning encourages me to understand the needs from ESL/EFL learners who may come from various orientations with a different degree of motivation. I strongly believe that as a language instructor it is my duty to provide students with language instructions that help them maintain the same level of their motivation or even enhance it for better learning experience. Furthermore, I see language instructions as a two-way street; that is, it is important to understand how the teaching is received by students as well as providing high quality of teaching based on SLA research and theories. What students can actually learn from the teaching may not be the same as I expect them to learn. I often ask students whether they follow my instructions to make sure that the teaching points and the learning points are reached together. When their answers are negative, I ensure to reflect their feedback on my own teaching and ask myself what went wrong and what could possibly be improved while asking students for their opinions as a reflective practitioner. As an active language instructor, understanding students’ cultural background including their L1, which can indicate what their strengths and weaknesses are in learning English, is another critical ability I pursue to advance and reflect on teaching. With knowledge of my L1, Japanese, I am confident to say that I can intuitively relate with what Japanese students might struggle. Also, having taught Japanese to students from different cultural background, I have acquired comprehension for some of the features that certain L1 speakers, including Spanish, Chinese, Korean, and Arabic, share as their strengths and weaknesses, which can be applied to teaching English. Knowing that there could be potential struggles among those students in one way or another has helped me establish the teaching style concerning L1 background. However, it is not to say that my language instruction is biased based on students’ L1 background. The aforementioned knowledge is a means to understand students better rather than making assumptions that could possibly hinder transparent language instruction that can be understood by students with any L1 background. Though I believe that the language instruction that I am able to provide broadly covers what is necessary in the lively ESL/EFL classroom, there are still areas that require further improvement in order for me to become a better professional in language teaching. One of the areas I must mention here is how to integrate different needs from each student into classroom instructions. For instance, one student may request for more practice on verbal communicative skills and another may demand for more training in writing skill. The discrepancy in needs between students could cause less satisfactory classroom experience among some of students if the goal of the instruction is weighed more in one or two communicative skills. Clear explanation of the lesson objective followed by well-planned instructions should certainly help students stay focused on the learning points during the class. To conclude, my teaching philosophy consists of understanding the goals of the institutions, understanding my role within that context and understanding who the students are, and what they need while creating a constructive environment that is fueled by feedback. Incorporating reflective practice into the teaching advances the flexibility and adjustability, as a way of overcoming general learning obstacles that many students encounter, which allow me to provide the best learning conditions increasing the probability of success in the language learning. |
Masaki Yoshikawa (吉川 真樹)
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