My teaching philosophy: An overview

Exposing students to engineering impacts on the environment and their community

• Solving an engineering problem requires consideration for external effects.
• By teaching students about how technology impacts the environment and other people, they learn how to improve their solutions to better serve society.
• Exposing students to the broad impacts their work has on the world inspires them to think deeply about the problem.

Developing engineering judgement using realistic problems

• Engineers use idealizations and assumptions to make problems easier to solve.
• When students are asked to assess their solutions by thinking about the assumptions they made, they begin to understand the nuances of engineering judgement.
• Students who understand the complexity of realistic problems seek help from their peers and mentors, ultimately improving their solutions.

Engaging learning with motivating problems, discussion, and collaboration in lectures

• Students grasp ideas more strongly when they are clearly laid out and applied to interesting problems.
• I teach by introducing a problem, asking students how they would approach the problem, and then teaching them the method they need to learn.
• Students can then apply the methods to a problem, which they solve in groups, to solidify the knowledge.

More information

See my teaching portfolio for more information and sample assignments.