Sriti Kumar Department of Computer Science

University of Georgia Sriti DOT cs AT uga DOT edu

Statement of Teaching Philosophy

I feel we learn everyday in our lives. Learning is an integrated part of our life. Being a researcher and a student I can understand that learning a very crucial part of a student’s life. As a teacher, I believe that it is my duty to encourage students to take an active approach in their learning. Teaching allows me to not only connect to people and learn from them but also gives me a chance to share my knowledge with them.

I feel all students learn way more if they interact more. So, in my class discussion of topics and groups activities are the most important. The more interactive the class will be more ideas will come up and students will learn more not just by the course materials but also by discussion which will in-turn encourage them to explore more in the area. I feel class discussions and assignments, projects and other homework’s will allow students to not only learn but also to apply the concepts.

I would like to my students not only to learn things but also share their knowledge with everyone. This can be done using discussions. The main aim of my teaching is to make them understand the concepts and also take active approach in their learning by helping them to become independent critical thinkers.

Another important tool for students is to become aware of their learning through teacher’s feedback. I feel grading gives us an opportunity to provide feedback and let the students know what more they can do to improve in their learning process. I feel it is right to reward accuracy and skillfulness but most important is, improvement. This approach -manifested in thorough, personalized, and constructive comments- is the type of feedback that motivates students to constantly give their best. In turn, to keep on giving my best as a teacher I would also provide opportunities for my students to comment on my performance.

Future goals for growth will to learn from students what they enjoy the most in class. Using what technique do they learn the most? Try to incorporate new stuff in the course which students feel is interesting or in other words is “cool” to learn.