Over the course of the last few months I have engaged in a number of professional dialogues on the FutureLearn platform. In relation to ‘The Big Question’ – whether teaching is necessary for learning to take place I raised the question of student motivation. A colleague replied to this and the consensus seemed to be that it ultimately depends to the motivation of the individual student and their particular aptitudes. Every class will have learners of differing levels relative to that subject area and it is important for the teacher to appreciate this and adapt their approach accordingly.

In relation to the topic of ‘What is inclusive learning and teaching?’ I responded to a colleagues comments regarding the difficulty in getting to know your students, particularly where you have a large number of them. I agreed with him that the best way to try and undertake this is to provide as many opportunities as possible for them to approach you with any concerns or questions they may have. A problem is that they may not be forthcoming particularly. In terms of how this can be circumvented, perhaps students could post some biographical information about themselves in a forum? In a previous teaching position I held learners began their year with a ‘Dear Tutor’ letter in which they set out their goals, desires and ambitions in addition to providing some details about their lives generally. This may be a good approach with some learner groups.

One discussion that I felt was very interesting was the one on learning styles. There is a considerable amount of disdain for learning styles generally it seems but ultimately, learning styles cannot be catered for 100% of the time. This all depends on the information or skills / training being delivered. It is impossible to teach someone to play the guitar if the teaching does not involve them picking a guitar up at any stage as an example. My contribution to this discussion involved the example of learning to fly an aeroplane- this cannot be done in a classroom setting.

Another contribution I made was on the topic of Diversity. I presently teach Chinese students at South West University of Political Science and Law in Chongqing. This student group is as diverse as any other – the only thing they really have in common is nationality. Within my groups there are many differnt people with different levels of ability relative to the subject matter. I still believe that ultimately it is impossible to tailor your teaching methods to each and every student you may have when working with such high numbers of students and that ultimately you have to do the best you can in the circumstances. This being said, what you must do, is ensure that you make reasonable adjustments when you are aware of a specific learning need or a particular learning preference a student has, provided that this is both reasonable and proportionate.

In terms of my teaching philosophy I have posted this elsewhere on my blog.

This course was called ‘Creativity in the Classroom’ and was delivered by Dr Mojtaba Ammari. This workshop was very positive – it encouraged me to reflect on the meaning of ‘creativity’ and to consider how this can be utilised within the context of a law classroom – unfairly, in my opinion, regarded as being not particularly creative places. It also made me consider questions of inclusivity – in particular, the quotation attributed to Einstein regarding not judging a fish by it’s ability to climb a tree provided some food for thought.

One concept which grasped me was that of ‘functional abstractionalism’ – ideas existing in a stand-alone context which flourish when introduced to either a real-world context or a new situation. This is perhaps something which is not utilised enough in the teaching of Law – there are many concepts which overlap across different areas and much of this is not discussed in the course of lectures or seminars.

There was also considerable overlap with the idea of ‘authenticity’. Authenticity is regarded as a facilitator of creative thought in a classroom setting. This is a good thing to be mindful of when designing lesson plans and seminar activities as, seemingly, the higher the likelihood of creative learning the higher the likelihood of students engaging higher order thinking skills and approaching a degree of innovation.

The first course I attended was run by Dr Mojtaba Ammari and was on the topic of ‘Authentic Assessment’ and focussed on the philosophy that assessment in the classroom should be as applicable to the real world as possible, ie ‘real world problem solving situations’ which a graduate may typically encounter in the workplace.

One thing which impressed me about authentic assessments was that they may be effective in tackling plagiarism / cheating if conducted in such a way that the authenticity of the students work can be verified in a live environment. Other important aspects included enabling learners to ‘buy in’ to assessments by showing them exactly how the skills or knowledge gained will help them in the ‘real world’.

I can replicate this to a certain degree with my Advocacy module which is a skills-based course I deliver in China as part of the Sino-UK joint program. This is a course which focusses on practical legal skills and naturally uses a live assessment method. One inherent limitation is the difficulty arising in involving Chinese employers in such initiatives whilst the module is being delivered in China. One link between my advocacy module and the workplace may be evident for the students who visit the UK for the 4^th year of their degree and participate in voluntary work with the Central England Law Centre. It may be a good idea to illustrate how this module relates to the real-world problem solving some of them will be doing in England as part of their final years study.

As part of my online study I was required to draft an outline of what my teaching philosophy consists of. Please find it below:

I see my role as a “lamplighter”, by which I mean that I hope to make the complicated simple and provide my learners with the clearest and most informed possible information from which they can then formulate their own opinions, judgments and knowledge-base. I believe in providing such information in a multitude of ways including the development of interactive learning materials and, hopefully, engaging and interesting video resources which are hosted on my YouTube channel known as ‘Legal Locomotive’, (available to visit at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuzqppW8HZxPUL_Da_BULBg) and also available on the Chinese equivalent known as ‘YouKu’. Related to this aspect of my philosophy is my opinion that some parts of the discipline I teach are inherently dry and uninteresting for undergraduate students.

In addition to my creation of engaging resources, this is recently demonstrated by the ‘SWUPL Movie Academy’, a ‘club’ open to our 4th year Chinese students which enables them to appear as actors in the video learning resources we produce for our OpenMoodle pre-study materials which are accessed in China. The first video was on referencing and is available here: https://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNDM4NDQwMzEyMA==.html?spm=a2hzp.8244740.0.0

I aim to be as approachable as possible to my students and try to make myself as reasonably available to them as possible and am always happy to field questions in person, by email and by other electronic means. In terms of the way in which I believe my students learn best, I believe that active participation in seminars – more so than lectures – is very important. I try to engineer such participation through the setting of group work and attempting to get the learners to engage in constructive debates. A way in which I try and draw these disparate aspects of my teaching philosophy together is by arranging interesting and stimulating activities which centre on a legal problem.

The most striking example of this is probably the series of seasonally appropriate Courtroom activities I arranged for my A-Level students in my last place of work. These included a trial of a man accused of murdering Father Christmas – on the predicate that he had mistaken him for a dangerous intruder.

If I had to write a book on teaching, it would probably be called “Making the Inaccessible Accessible”. This is from something that resonated with me on the Coventry University video about transformative learning and the educational strategy.

It would be spiteful, to put a jellyfish in a trifle

— Karl Pilkington.

This is the first post on my new blog. I’m just using it to reflect on what I have learned from having completed my first week of online study.

The first few activities have reminded me of some of the learning theories that I studied at Levels 3 and 5 before undertaking this course. I have been reminded of the principles of active learning and what this looks like.

It was also beneficial to be introduced to Transformative Learning and the Coventry Strategy including the 6 pillars.

An excercise I found particularly useful was the chance to write about my own teaching philosophy. This was beneficial from the perspective of clarifying my own priorities as a teacher and considering how these interact as they relate to my practice.

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

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