"Love for Econ Springs Eternal!”
– My Teaching Philosophy -
Thomas J. Meyer

Links:

1: The job of a community college and its instructor
2:  Learn who you are teaching and what motivates them
3:  Motivate with enthusiasm and realism!
4:  Evaluate fairly and give immediate feedback
5:  Give lots of encouragement

Part 1: The job of a community college and its instructor

In my view, community colleges meet needs of students who are dual-enrolled, or high school graduates, or have GEDs, or are displaced workers, or work in or run businesses, or are our community teachers, leaders, professionals or retirees.  Students pursue goals that are vocational-technical, or involve four-year transfer, retraining, community service, or for professional/personal attainment; each student has work, family schedules, and learning styles that vary.  In my view, my job as instructor is to adapt my daily lessons on principles of economics to these diverse people, to motivate each to want to study economics, and evaluate, counsel, and be present to all in my classroom and online.

Part 2:  Learn who you are teaching and what motivates them

I believe in developing methods for dealing with varied educational backgrounds, time restraints, and learning styles.  My daily class outlines are online to accommodate time constraints of working students. Each outline includes review, three measurable course objectives, optional bonus point pre-testing and post-testing by course objective to determine value added by instruction, class activities, a summary, and homework.  I select materials for readability, concept load, and real world application.  I design redundancy into delivery methods to reinforce concept learning, and to remain operational via Internet even when campus network servers malfunction.  Aural learners get nine minute slide series, lectures, question and answer, or problem-solving minutes followed by two-minute feedback sessions.  Visual learners get My Econ Lab (an Addison-Wesley tutorial) with animation, graphics, math tutorials and video clips.  Tactile learners progress around my classroom boards in 30-second stops to add additional elements to graphs or to problem-solving initiated by students ahead of them, until we face problems that require my intervention.  Students can exercise an option of writing papers on economic issues related to real world events by themselves, with a partner, or on a three person team.  Team members divide writing tasks, designing Power Point slides, and digitizing a sound recording of the work done.   

Part 3: Motivate with enthusiasm and realism!

The level of enthusiasm I bring to my lectures and student problem-solving helps motivate my students to persevere in their study of economic principles.  Fully 100% of my Survey of Economics students recently rated me with the highest grade possible for my interest in the subject matter I teach. No one leaves my classroom who hasn’t personally participated each day.  My courses are “hands-on.”  Everyone gets immersed in data analysis, current issues, and problem-solving with his or her team.  Seeking a common solution makes each team member interdependent; being able to explain a group solution to the class holds each teammate personally accountable.  I remind students that economics principles have nearly universal application. Everyone is constrained by scarce resources in the face of unlimited desires.  Scarcity forces choices upon us.  So I train students to weigh the added benefits against added costs at each step in their decision-making, and to discover what they do best. (That’s called the principle of comparative advantage.)  These ideas govern real world relations, even when NOT understood.  But I believe that everyone can profit from learning them.  “Indeed society is governed by little else,” to paraphrase J.M. Keynes.  Consequently, we know that economics is widely studied by students in many disciplines including law, engineering, medicine, and education.  I believe everyone can learn the economic way of thinking if lessons are adapted to their learning style, and if real world problem solving and encouragement provide appropriate incentive.  Or as I tell them: “Love for Econ, Springs Eternal!”

Part 4:  Evaluate Fairly AND give immediate feedback

I believe in evaluating in-class students and distant learners in the same way.  I test over material I teach, and what I teach is stored online for access by everyone.  Every course objective is followed by several pages of reading, two practice problems with solutions, and a self-test with answers to fill-in, true-false, multiple choice, graph-the-graph, and short answer or numeric problems.  Each exam question is preceded by the measurable course objective whose mastery is being measured.  Results are tabulated by course objective. Each exam includes a course critique, and a suggested menu of new approaches to try by anyone whose study process was not as efficient as possible.

I believe in presenting personalized encouragement by sending two-page mail-merged letters using a Microsoft Access database I created.  With a few keystrokes, each student sees how his or her score was calculated, how many points were lost on each course objective, what additional study methods I encourage them to try, and what the next portion of the principles of instruction will be about.  Knowing whom I teach, tailoring my teaching to fit their learning style, bringing my own love of economics into play, seeing that methods of measurement are fairly administered, and providing wise counsel for continuous improvement – these are the bulwark of my philosophy and attitudes about teaching economics.  I’m in love with learning, and with teaching economics!

1: The job of a community college and its instructor
2:  Learn who you are teaching and what motivates them
3:  Motivate with enthusiasm and realism!
4:  Evaluate fairly and give immediate feedback
5:  Give lots of encouragement