Five Ways to Improve Your Teaching

Evaluating and Improving Your Teaching

Five Ways to Improve Your Teaching

Linda von Hoene
Becoming an effective teacher involves seeking out multiple sites of input that can enable you to reflect on and improve the teaching and learning that takes place in your class. This section is designed to provide you with some suggestions about sources for dialogue and methods of feedback.

Dialogue with Yourself through a Teaching Log

One very important, but often overlooked, source of input on teaching is you, the teacher. A first step that can form the foundation for other critical reflection is to keep a daily teaching log or journal on your teaching. Start by writing your lesson plan on the right-hand side of your teaching notebook and reserving the left-hand side for comments and reflection. Questions to ask yourself and reflect on in writing might include, What worked well in this class, and why? What didn’t, and why? Where did the students seem to have difficulties? Were there any noticeable points where the students seemed very engaged with the material? What types of things may need greater clarification the next time? Were there any particular pedagogical strategies that seemed to work well? What will I change the next time I teach this topic?
In addition to informing your teaching on an ongoing basis, the reflecton fostered by keeping a teaching log will greatly assist you in writing up a statement of teaching philosophy for your teaching portfolio.
For further information on how to keep a teaching log, see:
Stephen Brookfield (1995). Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 72–75