Areas Da Luz Fontes_teaching Statement

Teaching Statement Teaching philosophy A central tenet of my teaching philosophy is my commitment to promoting long-term, meaningful learning. Therefore, it is important to me that my students learn the fundamental content of the courses I teach in depth and that they can apply the knowledge outside of the classroom. Beyond teaching the fundamental content of the course, it is essential to simultaneously foster students’ critical thinking, and facilitate the acquisition of life-long learning skills. For this reason, I emphasize the importance of engaging students in classroom lecture and activities by presenting information enthusiastically and relating information to students’ everyday experiences. By relating course content information to students’ everyday experiences, prior knowledge is activated, which is a critical component of successful encoding, which in turn results in more successful retrieval of information later on. Another tenet of my approach to teaching is edifying students’ motivation to meet and exceed their initial expectations. I find that students are motivated to learn when they are appropriately challenged. Therefore, I strive to demonstrate I have high expectations from my students in the way I present course content, engage students and in how I formulate assessments. I am prepared to teach a diversity of courses. I would be particularly interested in teaching courses on cognition, memory, psycholinguistics, bilingualism and learning. Mentoring Experience One of the most gratifying aspects of teaching is the opportunity to mentor students beyond the classroom. I enjoy introducing students to the scientific process: discussing their research interests and guiding them through the design, implementation and interpretation of their study. I find it particularly rewarding when I see students generate their own ideas based on findings from my own research program. I clearly recall at least one instance in which one of the undergraduate students I was mentoring came up with a great idea based on findings I was just presenting to the laboratory. I was explaining the larger cost I found when bilinguals had to reject dominant meanings of English ambiguous words that were also cognates with Spanish than simple English ambiguous words. She immediately suggested we investigate the effect in the bilinguals’ first language (Spanish) to see whether we would replicate the results in their native language. In other words, whether we would find the effect of cross-language activation in the other direction. One of the reasons I enjoy working closely and mentoring students on individual research projects is it allows me to have a more direct and long-lasting impact on the students’ academic careers. I feel that a close work relationship enables me to teach much more than I could otherwise. I believe that students who have the opportunity to engage in an in depth inquiry and hand s-on experience get a true sense of their interests and are better positioned to make appropriate and fulfilling careers choices. I believe mentoring students during these experiences allows me to make a difference in their academic achievement as well as life-long learning.

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