🏫 My Teaching Principles

We all remember a teacher who was just perfect. The teacher who was a joy to listen to, who was exceptionally smart and inspired us to learn.

I had a teacher like that as well. He taught Biology. And guess what? He was part of the reason why I chose to study Biomedical Sciences during my undergrad and devoted my life to life sciences.

Excellent teachers are incredibly valuable. They share knowledge, change lives and inspire people.

I believe everyone can be a teacher. It has only two requirements: to have knowledge in a field and the passion to share it with others. That's it. However, these two alone don't make you an excellent teacher.

As I'm doing my postgraduate studies right now, bad teaching pains me. In some cases, there is an underlying assumption that people who are excellent in their fields will also excel at teaching others. This is not true and I don't say this to blame. Becoming an excellent teacher takes effort.

But if you're not a teacher in a school or a professor at a university, why bother?

You see I believe, you will inevitably become a teacher due to the definition of the teacher. There will be situations where you will have a wider knowledge than someone else and you will have to rise to the occasion. Teaching is not on obligation. It is a privilege to give back and lift others up.

I would like to support you in this.

Inspired by Amazon's leadership principles, I collected my teaching principles. Please enjoy and feel free to reach out to share some of your principles on what makes an excellent teacher!

❓Ask why

Excellent teachers don't only teach learners the causations and correlations. Most effective studying comes from inspiring learners to ask the right questions (why?) and guiding them on their way to discover the answer.

🖼️ Metaphors and examples

Excellent teachers use metaphors and examples in delivering new information. By building on previous knowledge, the understanding is faster and deeper, thus, excellent teachers constantly seek imperfect similarities between the new and the old.

🧗 Micro vs Macro

Excellent teachers distinguish the big and the small picture. They effectively explain the large objectives, overarching ideas while also able to describe and put smaller details in place. This is key in making sure that the learners are not "lost".

🏋️ Practice

Excellent teachers know that mastery is coming from repetition. Practice makes perfect. Thus, teachers inspire learners to stay consistent and promote timely repetition. They help break down the new information into little chunks and provide techniques on how to practice.

⌛ Concise

Excellent teachers are concise and effective. They deliver information in the shortest time possible without comprising on understanding. Why spend time on understanding if that time can be used to deepen or teach new things?

🗣️ Simple language

Excellent teachers don't hide behind jargon. Excellent teachers can effectively simplify complex ideas. They can cut out and prioritise the less important elements and use everyday language to demonstrate these points.

🏡 Applications

Excellent teachers bring real-life examples and applications. They inspire learners to understand the world around them and showing real-life examples is the greatest demonstration of why one has to study a subject.

👀 Activating all senses

Excellent teachers work activating both visual and auditory senses. Whether in person or online, they use engaging visuals or energised body language.

🙀 Surprises

Excellent teachers use surprises to bring in new information. Surprises help keep the attention and retain information. And it doesn't have to be anything huge. Funny pictures, unorthodox language, or interesting colours do the work.

😁 Fun

While challenging, excellent teachers recognise that learning is a fun experience. By making people laugh, creating a positive environment, excellent teachers foster a better learning experience.

👏 Encouragement

Excellent teachers recognise learning is challenging. Understanding new information and memorising is hard. Thus, excellent teachers inspire learners to push their boundaries and step out of their comfort zone positively.

🔄 Feedback

Excellent teachers recognise that feedback is essential for development. They aim to provide frequent, honest, and constructive feedback at every given opportunity.

🏋️ Personalisation

Excellent teachers recognise how people think in different ways. They are flexible, they seek to understand the other person's thoughts and tailor their approach accordingly.

🔥 Enthusiasm

Excellent teachers share their enthusiasm with learners. They know that their responsibility is not only to deliver new information. They inspire learners to be curious, share their passion for the subject, and highlight the most interesting parts of the field.