Statement on Teaching

An Inclusive Approach

My teaching approach is informed by empirical research and diverse pedagogical perspectives. Here, I outline major themes in my teaching philosophy, and then discuss methods I have learned for their realization in physical and virtual classrooms. I finish by summarizing my track record in teaching, and express my professional goals for the near- and long-term.

My core approach to teaching is drawn from The First Peoples’ Principles of Learning, which stresses that all learning involves patience, reflects on identity, and ultimately supports the well-being of both the self and the community (First Nations Education Steering Committee, 2008). In other words, before any learning can take place, every learner needs to feel at home in a positive learning community. Empirical evidence supports this view: learners’ classroom performance is hindered when they feel isolated, stereotyped, or out-of-place (Spencer, Logel, & Davies, 2016). As such, my top priority is to facilitate an inclusive classroom culture that provides learners with the confidence to work flexibly towards core competencies.

This belief permeates all aspects of my teaching, but one of my favourite approaches to creating inclusive learning communities is to validate learners’ diverse perspectives and goals as they first enter the class. I do this by asking each learner to anonymously submit a list of their hopes for the course, and then leading a group reflection on our shared goals. This can be done using anonymous ballot responses in physical classrooms, or platforms like Google Slides for online classrooms. Activities like this one show learners that they are not academic adversaries, but rather collaborators in a community with common goals. The activity also enables tailored course materials that suit learners’ goals and experiences. For example, a plurality of students in my most recent cohort in honours-track Research Methods and Statistics wrote that they wanted to learn about machine learning, and this preference defined a 90-minute lecture later in the course.

In the Classroom

Throughout my career in research, I have at times used principles of human attention to create experiments that induce either sustained attention or mind wandering; two contrasting mental states marked by engagement in and disengagement from ongoing tasks (Csikszentmihalyi, 2014; Handy & Kam, 2015). I apply these same principles in the classroom to reduce mind wandering and promote sustained attention. For example, I provide learners with regular changes in pacing and activities. For online courses, I structure my lectures as bite-size videos oriented around specific topics (e.g., 15 minutes about the lobes of the brain). In-person, I use a similar tactic to punctuate periods of lecture with opportunities for learners to expand, discuss, or reflect. Beyond reducing mind wandering in the classroom, these exercises are intended to enrich learning in their own right.

“Expansion” activities typically involve multimedia content, and aim to present the lecture material from a different viewpoint or using a different approach. Research in post-secondary learners has shown that multimodal learning opportunities benefit the encoding of new information into memory (Wammes, Jonker, & Fernandes, 2019). “Discussion” activities are those which ask learners to work together to address open- or closed-ended questions pertaining to the material. My discussion activities generally encourage learners to move beyond recalling and understanding material, and towards applying it in a creative fashion (Krathwohl, 2002). “Reflection” activities may in some cases involve pausing the lecture to revisit the process by which we generated some new knowledge. For example, I may ask the group: “How did early psychologists use intelligence testing to compare children of different ages? Based on the passage we read from ‘The Mismeasure of Man’, how do we know intelligence testing is not always appropriate?”

The overarching goals of my in-class activities are to stimulate sustained interest in the topic, to create insight into learning processes, and to make sure learners continue to foster the sense of curiosity that originally led to their enrolling in my courses.

 “Spencer was the best! Such a bright, knowledgeable, approachable person. He was so helpful with our research projects and communicated the information very well. He was always very prepared for class and had lots of good feedback for us.”

-Anonymous student, Fall 2019

 Assessments with Purpose

I work hard to emphasize progress and growth while decoupling learners’ self-appraisals from their letter grades. To do this, I set clear learning objectives for each lesson, and take time to provide verbal encouragement and constructive feedback after assessments. I believe that these efforts provide learners with valuable signs of their progress (both individually and collectively), and outline clear directions for further growth. My hope is that celebrating progress and guiding growth will encourage learners to see themselves as progressing towards competencies rather than lacking mastery at the outset (i.e., Dweck, 2008).

Wherever possible, I try to introduce experiential learning opportunities with open-ended formative assessments (Kolb & Kolb, 2005; Michael, 2006; Warren, 2012). For example, in lessons about designing posters and visualizations for academic presentations, I show example materials (some of them my own) with many noticeably problematic elements. I then moderate a lively critique where learners can call out ways the materials could be improved. This encourages learners to engage with the material, and to understand that ‘good’ design is hard for everyone at first. In addition, this formative assessment gives me a holistic sense of group members’ backgrounds in statistics and graphic design which, in turn, helps me to determine the depth and direction of future lessons on the topic.

I believe in integrating formative assessments into lecture material. Rather than asking if there are any questions at the end of each lecture, apps like Padlet can be used to gather learners’ questions anonymously as they come up. This practice works well online and in-person, and is an effective means of reducing educational barriers to learners from diverse backgrounds. Having come to Québec as a post-doctoral researcher and a novice French speaker, I understand how frightening it can be to ask important questions verbally when feeling social anxiety or a language barrier exists.

Traditional summative assessments can provide diverse opportunities to demonstrate learning through recognition, recall, or critical application of course materials. However, these formats also have some limitations when it comes to serving learners of diverse styles and needs (Jeltova et al., 2011). One potential solution involves conducting two-stage exams in which learners complete an exam once on their own, and then a second time in small groups (Gilley & Clarkston, 2014). In some cases, however, flexible testing styles may be needed for individual summative assessments. When learners’ disabilities have created significant barriers preventing my assessments from accurately capturing their achievements, I have administered verbal exams among other testing accommodations.

“Spencer was so supportive and helpful to the students in the class. He put so much effort and care into his marking. He was always readily available to support us and answer any questions.”

-Anonymous student, Fall 2017

Ready to Teach

Since 2014, I have served in numerous teaching roles, including three courses as a Sessional Lecturer, four course sections as a Teaching Assistant, seven course sections as a Teaching Fellow (in which I was dually responsible for marking and leading seminars or tutorials). Additionally, in the months following the emergence of COVID-19, I logged nearly 400 contract hours with the UBC Psychology Online Teaching Task Force, whose mandate was to assist psychology instructors in rapidly adapting their courses to an online format.

All together, I have accrued more than 2,000 contract hours of teaching duties. They reflect 10 years of designing courses, developing laboratory manuals, lecturing, leading seminars, holding tutorials, interacting with learners online, grading, and administering exams. I have taught groups ranging from 30 to 300 learners.

I am prepared and eager to teach introductory psychology, introductory statistics, and advanced research methods and statistics. I am interested to develop courses related to addiction, cognition, health, and the history of psychology. In the coming years, I hope to continue improving as a teacher and communicator. I want to stay on top of the rapid advancement of online pedagogy. I will try out new forms of experiential learning, and new ways of conducting formative assessments to evaluate my performance as an instructor. ultimately, I hope to be a professor who contributes to university administration, conducts independent research, and leads classes that empower learners from all backgrounds to approach new challenges with enthusiasm and empiricism.

Sample Evaluations

References

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2014). Flow and the Foundations of Positive Psychology. New York: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9088-8

Dweck, C. S. (2008). Mindsets and Math / Science Achievement. The Opportunity Equation: Transforming Mathematics and Science Education for Citizenship and the Global Economy, 1–17. Retrieved from www.opportunityequation.org

First Nations Education Steering Committee. (2008). First Peoples Principles of Learning. Retrieved from http://www.fnesc.ca/wp/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/PUB-LFP-POSTER-Principles-of-Learning-First-Peoples-poster-11x17.pdf

Gilley, B. H., & Clarkston, B. (2014). Collaborative Testing: Evidence of of Undergraduate Students. Journal of College Science Teaching, 43(3), 83–91.

Handy, T. C., & Kam, J. W. Y. (2015). Mind Wandering and Selective Attention to the External World External Disengagement: Early Versus Late Selection. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 69(2), 183–189.

Jeltova, I., Birney, D., Fredine, N., Jarvin, L., Sternberg, R. J., & Grigorenko, E. L. (2011). Making instruction and assessment responsive to diverse students’ progress: Group-administered dynamic assessment in teaching mathematics. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 44(4), 381–395. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022219411407868

Kolb, A. Y., & Kolb, D. A. (2005). Learning styles and learning spaces: Enhancing experiential learning in higher education. Academy of Management Learning and Education, 4(2), 193–212. https://doi.org/10.5465/AMLE.2005.17268566

Krathwohl, D. R. (2002). A Revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy: An Overview. Theory Into Practice, 41(4), 212–218. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15430421tip4104

Michael, J. (2006). Where’s the evidence that active learning works? Advances in Physiology Education, 30(4), 159–167. https://doi.org/10.1152/advan.00053.2006

Spencer, S. J., Logel, C., & Davies, P. G. (2016). Stereotype threat. Annual Review of Psychology, 67, 415–437. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-073115-103235

Wammes, J. D., Jonker, T. R., & Fernandes, M. A. (2019). Drawing improves memory: The importance of multimodal encoding context. Cognition, 191(April). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2019.04.024

Warren, J. L. (2012). Does Service-Learning Increase Student Learning?: A Meta-Analysis. Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, (Spring), 56–61.