Saturday, March 21, 2015

PT: Physical Therapists, Passionate Teachers

We had yet another interesting activity for PT 138 last Thursday, March 19. It was called “three-way teaching.” When I first saw it on the syllabus, I completely had no idea about it. All we were instructed to do was prepare a skill to teach.
                I have not yet decided on a skill to teach until about an hour before the activity so I have not made proper preparations on how I will teach the skill and what approach am I going to take. I decided on teaching how to write and read Hangul, the Korean alphabet. Honestly, I was not very confident about this since it has been a bit long since I last used it. It actually showed as I was teaching my peer. One of the feedback I got was that I was a bit unsure while I was teaching. Confidence that you fully know what you will teach is crucial not only so that you can relay the information/skill well but also so that you can devise as many strategies to make it easier for the learner. It will also gain you trust from the learner if he/she sees that you are really familiar with what you are teaching. In line with this, feedback, an essential component of effective teaching, is better given if you know exactly what to watch out for. Assessing the learner’s current level is also important so as to better craft your objectives and teaching approach. Stressing the salience of the information/skill in relation to the learner is key to fully engage him/her.
                As the course goes by, I realized that a teacher is not only one who teaches within the four corners of a classroom. As a child, I dreamt of becoming a teacher. Through this activity, I realized that in this profession, I am a teacher. Maybe just not in the way I imagined it, but nonetheless working towards the same goal – to share what I know and let that be of help to others.

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