Module Summary

The Next Step

As you navigate the next, most challenging step – actually writing your teaching philosophy statement, here are a few tips you may want to keep in mind. 

1) Remember that a teaching philosophy statement is a reflective, personal statement you write about your teaching. It is written from the first-person perspective (e.g., “I”, “me” and “my”) and is generally expected to be one to two pages in length, single-spaced (Chism, 1998), though one page is typically preferred. While there are many things that you may consider including in your teaching philosophy statement, as a starting point it is good to consider four core components: teaching beliefs, methods, impacts, and goals. 

2) Be sure to inject your own style and personality into your teaching philosophy statement. In reflecting on and writing about your beliefs, methods, impacts and goals, there are various ways in which you might structure your statement.  

Some people like a linear essay format where they discuss each component in turn. Others like to structure their statement around key pillars (often presented and then expanded upon in paragraphs labeled with headings), with each pillar connecting beliefs, methods, impacts, and goals.  

Using a metaphor to explain your statement and tie it all together is another option that you may wish to consider. Some examples of metaphors, adapted from Apps (1991), include:  

• Lamplighters: Illuminate the minds of their learners 
• Gardeners: Cultivate the mind by nourishing, enhancing the climate, removing impediments, and then standing back and allowing growth to occur 
• Muscle Builders: Exercise and strengthen flabby minds so learners can face the heavyweight learning tasks of the future 
• Challengers: Question learners’ assumptions, helping them see subject matter in fresh ways and develop critical thinking skills 
• Travel Guides: Assist people along the path of learning 
• Factory Supervisors: Make certain that sufficient inputs are present and that the outputs are consistent with the inputs 
• Applied Scientists: Apply research findings to teaching problems and see scientific research as the basis for teaching 
• Craftspeople: Use various teaching skills and are able to analyze teaching situations, apply scientific findings when applicable, and incorporate an artistic dimension into teaching 

Finally, as noted in McMaster’s Preparing a Teaching Portfolio Guidebook (MacPherson Institute, 2024), some prefer to use narrative as “a way to blend [their] teaching experiences, achievements, and beliefs into a cohesive and compelling story. By investing time and effort into crafting a compelling narrative, [they] can elevate [their] portfolio from a mere collection of documents to a powerful tool for professional advancement and growth.” This approach comes with benefits for both the author (e.g., narrative can weave together anecdotes, reflections, and insights with evaluations and numbers), and reviewer (e.g., reading a personalized narrative is more engaging than a list of accomplishments or records alone).  

The most important thing is that you choose a style for your teaching philosophy statement that best exemplifies you, while at the same time providing some structure (and introduction – ideally with an attention-grabbing opening statement, body, and conclusion).  

3) Explicitly incorporate your discipline into your teaching philosophy statement. This might mean describing the specific strategies you use to support student learning in your discipline, recognizing and outlining how you overcome common disciplinary-specific learning hurdles, and so on. 

4) If you want to take you teaching philosophy statement to the next level, ground it in teaching and learning scholarship by adding a few in-text citations for quality, peer-reviewed sources. After reflecting on your beliefs, methods, impacts, and goals (during which time teaching and learning scholarship may have already come into play), take a look at the research that has been done that either supports or refutes what you have said in your statement. You will learn from the literature and based on the knowledge gained, be able to make decisions regarding whether and how you might revise your statement. By grounding your statement in scholarship, you’re not just saying “here’s what I believe and how I demonstrate it”. Rather, you’re saying, “here’s what I believe and how I demonstrate it, and here is the research showing that the methods that I employ have been found to be effective.”  

5) Perhaps most importantly, remember to check your statement for alignment. There should be consistency in what you say you believe, the teaching methods you use to enact those beliefs, how you measure the impact of your teaching, and your teaching related goals. Although this seems straightforward in theory, it can be kind of tricky in practice. 

6) Make sure you get one or two trusted people to read your statement, screening it for grammar and spelling errors, checking for consistency, and making recommendations for enhancement. As a teaching philosophy statement is a very personal document at its core, it’s normal to feel a little anxious about what others may think when reading your statement.   

Since teaching philosophy statements are so personal, we don’t recommend looking at other people’s statements while you’re in the process of writing your own as it’s very easy to start writing in someone else’s style and voice. By completing the process on your own first, it will allow for your own personal style and ideas to shine through, making for a more authentic, stronger statement.

7) It is for similar reasons to those noted above that we don’t recommend you use generative artificial intelligence to craft your teaching philosophy statement. Write your first draft yourself, and then, if you really want to leverage generative artificial intelligence to make your statement even better, you might consider using a prompt that will have generative AI suggest some simple grammar and spelling/copyediting recommendations. If you do use generative artificial intelligence, do follow your institution’s norms and expectations regarding how you should cite its usage.  

8) Finally, remember that writing a teaching philosophy statement is an iterative process and that your statement should be updated as you grow and mature as an instructor. As you develop, so too will your beliefs, methods, impacts, and goals.