Thanks for your post. I agree that teachers (and students) should be free to express their personal beliefs in the classroom, and have open discussions. What they shouldn’t do is to impose their beliefs on the students.
Author: saloumeh
Comment on professionals are still human beings by Saloumeh
I really liked your post! I felt this way too, but as I started working with my adviser, and other graduate students during my PhD degree, I figured out that no one is perfect. We are all human, we have all experienced failure, and the best we can do is to try to be “great,” but not “perfect.”
Comment on Knowing Is Not Nearly Enough…. by Saloumeh
I think you made a good point! I totally agree that education alone does not necessarily humanize us. We need to ask ourselves how are we going to apply our education to serve the society and human beings.
Comment on Teachers and Learners – Critical Pedagogy by Saloumeh
Thanks for your post. I totally agree that we (as future teachers) need to be open minded and develop critical thinking. I have experienced similar situations when I suddenly understood something while I was explaining it to a student, or answering his/her question. So, it is important to encourage our teachers to be learners.
Comment on Diversity benefits everyone by Saloumeh
Thanks for your post. I totally agree that diversity brings many benefits, such as inspiring creativity and improving the productivity, but as you mentioned, it has its own challenges, too. Sometimes prejudice or negative cultural stereotypes make it hard for some members to communicate with others and let their voices be heard. Hence, in order to get the most out of the existence of diversity in the society, we first need to learn how to face these challenges. This is something I am really looking forward to learn.
Comment on Diversity….brilliant minds working together…. by saloumeh
I really enjoyed that article as well, and specially the “democrats vs. republicans” example. I think it is totally true. As a personal example, one member of my Ph.D. committee is not from my department (not even in academia), and since he has a totally different perspective, I always feel that I need to be more prepared to convince him.
Comment on What animals can teach us about inclusive pedagogy by Saloumeh
I really enjoyed your post! I think you pointed out a very cute fact about animals and how they are open to befriend other species. As you mentioned, some behavior in animals could not exactly be considered as teaching and are more instinctively driven, but still the fact that they accept other species as their own and behave them the same way is very cute and instructive!
Comment on My authentic teaching self by saloumeh
Thanks for your post. First, I really liked the fact that you are trying to be yourself not anyone else, and you have your own teaching style. Second, I liked that you mentioned trying to create a balance between being firm and flexible. Although, I found it a bit challenging in my personal teaching experiences.
Comment on Lets Get Real by saloumeh
Thanks for your post. I totally agree that people have their own teaching style and mimicking another instructor’s notes does not lead to an efficient way of teaching.
Comment on A+ by saloumeh
I agree! Grades prevent students to grow the courage to think out of box and pursue their creativity. I think there is a lot of room for improvement in our current grading system. The first step we may need to take is to try to make the assessment process more individualized.
