The knife is not owned for the knife's sake, but rather its purpose is to solve greater problems.

Teaching, for me, is not solely about fostering student mastery of the course material. More importantly, my aim is to cultivate deeper, broader more important skills such as critical thinking and communication with each lecture, assignment, and activity. I believe that learning is maximized when students are involved in and critically thinking about psychological issues. To do this, I encourage students to analytically question the material as well me as the conveyor of this knowledge. Through the use of simulations, demonstrative and other active learning approaches, students get a snippet of knowledge presented in a very approachable realistic manner. Additionally, I attempt to instill in my students that the material they are learning in class is not only useful for determining their success in the class, but rather the psychological knowledge is applicable to their everyday lives.

Not every problem is a nail; therefore not every solution needs a hammer.

Teaching cannot be summed up with one method or approach, but rather the means by which knowledge is given to students and learning takes place is dependent on both the subject matter as well as the learning styles of the students. I believe that it's not about whether students can learn the material, but how. I strive to be sensitive and aware of the needs of students and realize that there are numerous diverse backgrounds and attributes of students that affect the ways in which they learn. By taking an approach teaching that encompasses many varied method of transmitting the knowledge, I continually attempt to meet the learning demands of all students. On the flipside is that not all topics can be taught in the same way. Teaching statistics necessitates something different than teaching the history of psychology which necessitates something different than teaching about the functioning of the brain. In realizing the breadth of topics within psychology, I strive to teach each topic a manner that is most effective and appropriate. Additionally, with the rapid advancement of the field, it is necessary for me as both a learner and teacher to continually update my knowledge and methods of teaching.

Fixing things-learning to love the challenge.

For me, teaching is challenging in that no two days of class are identical, no two students are identical, and no two methods are identical. However, therein lays the reward-rising to the challenge of constantly changing material, students, and methods. I have always loved "fixing things," solving problems, and sharing my solutions. Teaching has given me a new love-helping students through this process of learning what the problems are, helping them discover the tools they have to solve the problems, watching them use the tools, and finally, seeing the satisfaction that comes with that self-reliance and independence of thought. Furthermore, I have discovered that I am learning as much as I am teaching. Although I may only see one solution to the problem and use my "knife" that way, students are always stretching the limits and finding different tools to use on the same problem providing proof that I've accomplished what I set out to do.