Understanding yourself as an instructor
Why is it important for you to have an understanding of yourself as an instructional leader?
It is very important for you to understand yourself before you jump into a classroom. Understanding yourself will allow you to better prepare for the act of teaching. If you don't really know how you spend your time, it will be too late to find out in the classroom when you enter without the handouts because you didn't have time to prepare them. It is also important to discvoer your personality. If you are a shy person you will need to work on being a little more approachable to the students. A shy person can still be a great teacher but they first must realize this about themselves. Also, if you are a person that runs late and dresses sloppy, you will need to understand that as an instructor you will need to work on these things. Instructors are the role models of the classroom and if the instructor is coming in late dressed all sloppy, then the students may think that it is okay form them to also enter class this way.
In order for you to perform in the classroom, you must be confident in the person presenting the information. Students do not respond to instructors who come into the room and do not know what they are talking about. Nor do they want to receive information from someone who is not prepared.
I think that if you, as an instructor, do not have an understanding of your own strengths and weaknesses, it puts you in at a disadvantage right off the bat. This given the instructor an opportunity to learn new things. Any learning opportunity helps them become more secure in what they do and conveys a more poised and self assured leader.
It is important for an instructor to know and understand himself, because he can use his own strengths to counteract some of his weaknesses. An example of this would be an instructor that has an outgoing personality and finds that communication is one of his stronger points, but finds that he has a difficult time keeping the students engaged. He may be a socratic instructor, using his communication skills to his advantage by asking the students questions that get them to think, interact, and bounce ideas off of each other. This will automatically engage the students, and therefore, the instructor's goal of student learning will have been met.
I agree with Jodie. I think that it is essential as an instructor to have insight into your personality traits, and how those traits will impact your instructional style. I am very passionate about my career field and I think that comes across to my students, which in turn keeps them engaged in the classroom setting. One of my personality traits that negatively impacts my teaching ability at times is impatience. Learning has always come fairly easily for me, and at times I forget that not everyone does. It is the one thing that I work diligently on each term, and have made some good improvements.
I think that the more an instructor learns, the better they are for their students. I also learn from my students everyday.
Every needs to understand their strengths and weaknesses. This will allow you not only to become a better teacher, but a lifelong student as well. In the education setting that we are in, we must continually look for better ways to convey the message to our students and this means being a student ourselves. This is why we partake constantly in Professional Developtement and Technicaly Developtment. To make ourselves better instructors for our students.
So true. Our students understand that we are human and all they expect from us is consistency and to remain current in our fields of expertise. Understanding ourselves and our stengths an weaknesses is key to becoming a better instructor.
As an instructional leader, I need to understand myself because this will help me to realize both my strengths and weaknesses.
Having a full understanding of my traits, skills, temperament, and passions lets me know how to plan my coursework. If I find I am weak in a few areas, I can help cultivate those skills by practicing and focussing on those. Doing so, will give me the strength and determination to grow as an instructional leader.
I should also fully know myself to the point of understanding that I do not need to change who I am, but I do need to allow growth to get past my comfort zone. When students see me doing this, they will find encouragement to try new areas of learning as well.
Understanding myself as an instructional leader is a win-win for everyone, both for the student and instructor.
It is vital to understand myself as an instructor so that I may impart to my students the maximum amount of knowledge in the relatively short time that we have together. I have been a computer programmer/analyst for some 35 years now and my goal is to impart as much as possible of what I have experienced to each and everyone of my students. I use as many "real-world" examples as possible. I am very diligent about ensuring that my students thoroughly understand every topic before we move on to the next topic. Learning comes easily to me and I sometimes tend to forget that I have a very diverse group of students from a wide variety of cultural backgrounds who may not learn as easily as I have. I work hard at ensuring that I remember that my students have a very different background than I do.
It's important to have an understanding of myself as an instructional leader so that I can have a positive impact on student learning and retention.
When I'm enthusiastic and demonstrate how much I love teaching, it shows. This creates a more positive learning environment for my students!
One of my favorite inspirational quotes, by Maya Angelou, is: "When you learn, teach, when you get, give."
This is an interesting topic for me. Since I am a young instructor I must always be aware of how I am coming across to students, some my age. I have been in a professional atmosphere most of my life so I have no problem acting like a professional but sometimes students try to get on that "buddy system" or intimidate me but I quickly adapted to these situations. By me having a solid understanding of myself, I am able to seem older(wiser).
By understanding yourself you can realize your capabilities, strengths and weaknesses. Knowing this you can effect changes/modifications in the way you instruct and approach students, as well as in how you manage your course materials and presentation. Instructors in the Career School should always strive to the best performance of their duties so that we can look at graduates and hopefully see them successfully employed in the field for which we have prepared them.
It is through knowing one's self that we can find out what our true strength and weaknesses are. Knowing our weaknesses help us as week seek self improvement. As we work on our deficiencies, we can also take advantage of our strengths. This can potentially avoid embarrassing moments as well as any loss of credibility.
I have to understand what type of instructor I am in order to tailor my material and delivery to that style, especially early in the term. I work on improving my weaker areas, however playing to my strengths will keep the students engaged. As I continue to improve, I'll have more strengths to play to and less weak areas.
I believe if you do not have a good grasp of who you are, your strong suits and weak areas you will not be able to be as effective as you might like. I always think to myself how would I recieve me and the information I am bringing to class if I were a student. I have had great sucess looking at things as my students might.
To best assess what I may do correctly for creating the best learning environment for the students; how I can address shortcomings and imperfections to enhance my skills and methods; and how I can develop a healthy self-concept necessary to being an empathic, patient, and effective instructor.
Hi James:
Great self analysis! We are more effective when we understand where our strengths and uniquenes's stand out and can be incorporated into our teachers personality. And the closer that personality is to our real selves, honest, creative, and sincere instructional sessions will be the result.
Regards, Barry
It's important that I know my strengths and weaknesses as an instructor. For example I know that I can be easily distracted by topics that are not relevant to the classroom material. Sometimes the discussions are a nice short break for the students, but there have been occasions where I regret the tangent the discussion took, and the time wasted off topic. Being aware of this weakness helps me keep it in check, and minimize or eliminate it completely.
