Reflecting on my teaching for learning journey, I have come to realise that whilst I have been employed as a lecturer in varying capacities for over 15 years, I have only recently begun to develop an understanding of myself as a deliberate professional (Trede & McEwen, 2016) and incorporate ‘academic’ as one of my evolving identities. Several months after graduation I was offered an opportunity to join the UTS DAB Faculty as a software teaching assistant in the Fashion & Textiles course. In my second semester, the staff member I had previously supported left the university and I was promoted to Design lecturer. From here other opportunities within the faculty presented themselves and I soon found myself creating and delivering numerous classes for which I had technical expertise, despite my lack of professional and pedagogical experience or understanding.
I never anticipated working within Higher Education (HE), yet also had no clear vision for how my professional life as a designer would unfold post university either. As a carefree adventurer with wanderlust in my early 20s, I was happy to see where the perceived high level of compensation and time flexibility that accompanied my new position as an accidental academic would take me and continued to balance teaching and freelance design work for the next decade of my life. I had an instant affinity for the teaching process, despite initially experiencing a strong case of imposter syndrome, and have since continued to develop a genuine love and passion for my role as an educator, despite feeling out of my depth at times. Becoming a teacher has been less of a conscious decision for me and more of an evolving discovery of something that already existed within me. This process is iterative, and my conception of my educator identity is in a continual state of becoming as I learn and embrace more about myself.
The common thread within my unconventional HE career trajectory has been my values and beliefs about teaching and learning, which have remained consistent since my first class. I draw fulfilment from the reciprocal relationship of teaching and learning and enjoy inspiring and being inspired by others to master new skills, build confidence and experience personal and professional growth and development. My conception of a good teacher is synonymous with my conception of a good person, and as such I have encountered many ‘teachers’, in both traditional and untraditional contexts, who have inspired the type of reflective and self-aware human being and educator I want to be. The values of empathy, curiosity, and adaptability underpin my approach as an educator, and within my personal life, and I aspire to connect with my students authentically using a pedagogy of kindness (Rawle, 2021). I desire to interact as a human being first and prioritise human-centered teaching and learning conversations and experiences, rather than strongly delineating the roles of ‘teacher’ or ‘student’ and the resultant behaviours and hierarchies that accompany such roles.
During the upheaval of Covid, I found my hours as a casual academic at UTS dramatically cut with little notice and experienced an extended lull within my professional practice. In response to these challenges, and under the advice of past university supervisors and mentors, I accepted a full-time lecturing role at SAE Creative Media Institute, whilst also continuing to co-teach several of the classes that I have developed and taught at UTS over the past 15 years. It has been since taking this more financially secure position and being able to direct all my energy towards education, that I have most flourished as a teacher. In the past year, I have immersed myself in professional development opportunities such as this course, a Master of Education (Learning & Leadership) and an Advance HE Fellowship and have seen my student engagement soar and my professional advancement rapidly escalate. I now feel I am developing the skills, knowledge, and confidence to really step into my full potential as an educator.
For much of my time as an educator I was incredibly time-poor and relied heavily on my technical knowledge and ability to explain complex ideas simply within in-person situations, however in the past few years, as the design industry and HE landscape have rapidly shifted, so too have my teaching practices and understanding and interest in pedagogy. I currently find my teaching philosophy aligned with the Socratic conception that “education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel” (Leef, 2019). As I have explored HE through a lens of literature and deepened my experience with peer feedback, communities of practice, classroom assessment techniques (CATS) (Chism et al., 1995) and authentic feedback and assessment, I have gravitated away from focusing on improving the delivery of discipline-specific skills and knowledge, to positioning myself as an interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary educator who specialises in the creation of inclusive classrooms offering differentiated student-centric learning experiences that nurture individual needs. These days I prioritise innovative active learning methods and encourage understanding, exploration, and questioning of the status quo. Connecting with my students relationally by modelling empathy within my communications with them, encouraging reflection and student agency, and encouraging open conversations is foundational to my current professional approach which aims to generate meaningful experiences that align with institutional agendas to accessibly facilitate student engagement.
Within this educational autobiography, I have combined Moon’s four levels of reflective writing framework (Moon, 2004), Brookfield’s four lenses approach for evaluating professional progress and impact (1998), and Burton’s reflective process (2019). Utilising this framework and approaches has helped structure my thinking and writing in this area, which has in turn evolved my personal understanding of my identities as an academic and deliberate professional. I also strongly resonated with Percy’s blog about building belonging (2021) and found the four principles outlined in the infographic to be an exact match for the way I aspire to authentically connect with my classes. My conception of academic identity continues to develop iteratively and is in a constantly evolving state of fluidity and change as I continue to reflect on how my roles and relationships within the landscape of HE itself grow and contract. The way in which I have positioned myself within the context of higher education continues to evolve relative to the shifting context in which I operate, however, the foundational values under which I operate remain consistent.
References:
Brookfield, S. (1998), Critically reflective practice. J. Contin. Educ. Health Prof., 18: 197-205
Burton, R. (2019, June 6). Writing your Educational Autobiography. Www.youtube.com. https://youtu.be/az-JdOEAU3k
Chism, N. V. N., Angelo, T. A., & Cross, K. P. (1995). Classroom Assessment Techniques: A Handbook for College Teachers. The Journal of Higher Education, 66(1), 108. https://doi.org/10.2307/2943957
Leef, G. (2019, October 21). “The Kindling of a Flame, Not the Filling of a Vessel.” National Review. https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/the-kindling-of-a-flame-not-the-filling-of-a-vessel/
Moon, J. A. (2004). A Handbook of Reflective and Experiential Learning: Theory and Practice. Routledge.
Percy, A. (2021, November 10). Building belonging in 2022 at UTS: a helpful infographic. LX at UTS. https://lx.uts.edu.au/blog/2021/11/11/building-belonging-in-2022/
Trede, F., & McEwen, C. (2016). Educating the deliberate professional: preparing for future practices. Springer.
Rawle, F. (2021, August 20). A pedagogy of kindness: the cornerstone for student learning and wellness. THE Campus Learn, Share, Connect. https://www.timeshighereducation.com/campus/pedagogy-kindness-cornerstone-student-learning-and-wellness
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