As an emerging educator and researcher, I have taught a variety of courses across multiple disciplines. My teaching philosophy is rooted in fostering critical thinking, promoting collaboration, and facilitating the real-world application of theoretical concepts. I am committed to creating an engaging learning environment where students actively participate and develop the skills necessary for academic and professional success.
Teaching Philosophy and Methods
I employ a student-centered approach that emphasizes active engagement and critical analysis. Through the incorporation of interactive techniques in my teaching, I inspire students to engage deeply with intricate subjects and actively contribute to class discussions. This approach not only enhances their understanding of the subject matter but also develops their ability to apply knowledge to practical, real-world scenarios.
In my classes, I prioritize connecting theory with practice. I design assignments and activities that require students to collaborate, problem-solve, and reflect on how course concepts impact real-life situations. This experiential learning fosters a deeper comprehension of the material and equips students with the skills to navigate and address contemporary challenges in their respective fields.
Below are examples of pedagogies I employed for teaching Social Determinants of Health. These case studies illustrate how innovative methods, such as case-based learning, peer reviews, and concept mapping, were used to engage students actively and deepen their understanding of complex health issues.
Description: I designed this World Café activity to immerse students in critical discussions about the Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) and to underscore their essential role within the students’ field of study. Recognizing that this course serves as a foundational platform, my objective was to move students beyond viewing SDoH as abstract concepts, encouraging them to appreciate these determinants as real factors they will encounter in their future academic and professional pursuits.
Through this interactive activity, students explored the connections between SDoH and health disparities, both in general terms and through specific examples such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Each group was assigned a unique question related to the importance and impact of SDoH:
- Understanding SDoH: Why is understanding the Social Determinants of Health important?
- Interplay of Determinants: How does the interplay of different SDoH influence individual health outcomes?
- SDoH and COVID-19: Can you provide examples of how SDoH affected particular populations during the COVID-19 pandemic?
The activity focused on key factors such as income, education, employment, access to healthcare, and living conditions, allowing students to investigate how these determinants intersect and contribute to health inequalities.
Goals for Students: The primary goal was to help students recognize how SDoH directly relate to their academic journey and future careers. Grounding the discussion in real-world applications—such as how the COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately affected certain populations—I aimed for students to realize that understanding SDoH is crucial for making informed decisions in health-related fields.
This activity not only provided a foundation for future coursework but also highlighted the relevance of these determinants in shaping public policy, healthcare interventions, and community health outcomes. I wanted students to think critically about the role of SDoH in real-world health outcomes and policies, fostering a deeper comprehension of their significance.
How the Activity Encourages Participation: The World Café format was intentionally designed to foster active and meaningful participation. Students were divided into small, diverse groups to engage deeply with their assigned questions. After an initial discussion, they rotated to other groups, building upon each other’s ideas and developing a more comprehensive understanding of how SDoH operate in different contexts.
Collaborative Learning Environment: This format promoted a collaborative learning environment where students became co-creators of knowledge, actively shaping the discussion and learning from their peers.
- Peer Review and Reflection: The peer review component, where students evaluated each other’s insights and proposed interventions, encouraged reflection and deeper engagement.
- Roles and Responsibilities: Assigning specific roles within groups—such as facilitator, note-taker, researcher, and presenter—ensured that each student had a responsibility, promoting accountability and active involvement.
At the end of the activity, students were expected to analyze how their newfound understanding of SDoH could be applied to their field of study. The discussions and reflections helped them appreciate the importance of this course as foundational for their academic and professional development.
Reflection on Outcomes: The activity significantly enhanced student engagement and understanding of the Social Determinants of Health. Students demonstrated improved critical thinking skills, particularly in analyzing complex social issues and understanding the multifaceted impacts of SDoH on health outcomes.
Feedback indicated that the real-world context and the collaborative, interactive format made the learning experience more impactful and memorable. Students appreciated the opportunity to connect theoretical concepts with real-world applications, enhancing their appreciation for the importance of SDoH in their future careers.
Description: I designed this activity to deeply engage students in analyzing a real-life case study centered on Sarah, a single mother working multiple jobs in a low-income neighborhood. Her three children face significant challenges, including food insecurity, inadequate educational resources, and a lack of safe play spaces—all of which adversely affect their development. Students are tasked with applying key principles of the social determinants of health to explore how income, education, employment, and living conditions impact Sarah’s family.
Student Tasks: For each factor, students are required to answer the following questions:
- Impact on Sarah’s Children: How does this factor affect Sarah’s children?
- Interrelation with Other Factors: How is this factor interrelated with other factors?
- Proposed Interventions: What interventions could improve outcomes related to this factor?
- Long-Term Implications: What are the long-term impacts if this factor is not addressed?
Goals for Students: My goal was to help students understand how these determinants intersect and to challenge them to propose thoughtful, realistic interventions. By analyzing the case, students are encouraged to think about both immediate impacts and long-term outcomes of unaddressed socioeconomic issues, fostering a deeper comprehension of the complexities involved in early childhood development within disadvantaged contexts.
How the Activity Encourages Participation: To promote active engagement, students work in diverse groups with designated roles such as note-taker, researcher, discussion leader, and spokesperson, ensuring each student has a specific responsibility and contributes uniquely to the group’s efforts.
- Collaborative Learning: This structure fosters a collaborative learning environment where students learn from each other’s insights.
- Peer Review Process: Following group work, students engage in a peer review where each group evaluates another’s proposed interventions, offering constructive feedback.
- Reflective Discussion: A final class-wide reflection facilitates a comprehensive discussion of their findings and explores broader implications for public policy and community initiatives.
This approach allows students to reflect on their perspectives, gain insights into alternative solutions, and refine their understanding through collaboration and critical thinking.
Reflection on Outcomes: The activity significantly enhanced student engagement and understanding. Students demonstrated improved critical thinking skills, particularly in analyzing complex social issues and developing multifaceted intervention strategies. Feedback indicated that the real-life context and collaborative elements made the learning experience more impactful and memorable.
Description: This activity is designed to help students develop the skill of crafting clear, specific, and arguable thesis statements for their final essays. Central to the workshop is a concept mapping exercise where students explore the question: “How do colonialism, racism, and social exclusion impact health outcomes?” This question serves as a foundation for analyzing how these social determinants contribute to health disparities and linking causes to their effects.
Example Concept Map: The concept map focuses on Racism, using real-world examples to illustrate how it leads to specific health outcomes. Students are expected to structure their maps as follows:
- Identify and Explore Causes:
- Central Cause: Racism
- Structural Racism: Systemic policies that limit access to healthcare, education, and housing.
- Effect: Poor access to quality care, leading to chronic illnesses.
- Impact: Higher mortality rates and shorter life expectancy.
- Example: Redlining policies that segregate neighborhoods, contributing to environmental hazards.
- Discrimination in Healthcare: Racial biases affecting the quality of care.
- Effect: Dismissed symptoms and delayed treatments.
- Impact: Increased risk of preventable diseases.
- Example: Patients receiving inadequate pain management due to racial stereotypes.
- Environmental Racism: Disproportionate exposure to pollutants in minority communities.
- Effect: Higher rates of asthma and respiratory illnesses.
- Example: Water crises exposing communities to contaminated water.
- Structural Racism: Systemic policies that limit access to healthcare, education, and housing.
- Central Cause: Racism
- Link Causes to Effects:
- Structural Racism → Limited Healthcare Access → Higher Rates of Chronic Diseases.
- Discrimination in Healthcare → Dismissed Symptoms → Increased Mortality Rates.
- Connect Effects to Impacts:
- Chronic diseases result in higher healthcare costs and reduced life expectancy.
- Health disparities lead to mistrust in the healthcare system, reinforcing poor health outcomes.
This framework helps students identify how different forms of social exclusion contribute to health disparities and connect those causes to broader health outcomes.
Essence of the Question: The central question encourages critical thinking about the historical and social forces that shape health inequalities. It pushes students to explore how colonialism, racism, and social exclusion create long-lasting impacts on access to healthcare and overall health. Through this exercise, students gain an understanding of the systemic roots of health disparities, offering both historical and contemporary perspectives on why these issues matter. This comprehensive understanding lays the foundation for more nuanced, interdisciplinary approaches to solving these challenges.
Goals for Students: The primary goal is for students to learn how to create strong, defensible thesis statements while enhancing their ability to visualize and structure complex ideas through concept mapping. The exercise also aims to foster a deeper understanding of how social determinants, such as racism and colonialism, impact health, providing a foundation for future academic and professional work.
How the Activity Encourages Participation: Students collaborate in peer review sessions to critique thesis statements, ensuring active engagement and refinement of their arguments. The concept mapping portion encourages deeper exploration of topics like colonialism and racism by breaking down their effects on health outcomes. Visualizing these connections enables students to grasp the complexity of health disparities and equips them with tools to structure their essays more effectively.
Reflection on Outcomes: The activity significantly enhances students’ ability to craft strong thesis statements and structure complex ideas visually. Students demonstrate improved critical thinking skills and a deeper understanding of the systemic factors contributing to health disparities. Feedback indicates that the combination of concept mapping and peer review makes the learning experience more engaging and effective. Students appreciate the opportunity to connect theoretical concepts with practical skills, enhancing their preparedness for future academic challenges.
Description: This activity is designed to help students delve into the intricate connections between addiction, food insecurity, shelter, and health outcomes. The purpose is to encourage students to understand how these social determinants of health (SDoH) contribute to broader public health challenges. Students are divided into groups, each assigned a specific focus—addiction, food insecurity, or shelter—and tasked with researching the topic. The culmination of their research is a poster that visually summarizes their findings, drawing from academic articles and reliable data sources.
The posters provide a platform for students to synthesize key insights, connecting them to the health outcomes of different populations. Students are expected to illustrate the complex relationships between SDoH and health, and to critically analyze how these factors play out in real-world scenarios. After researching their topics, students present their posters to the class, leading to discussions about how addiction, food insecurity, and homelessness intertwine with health disparities.
Examples:
- Addiction Topic:
- Substance Abuse and Mental Health:
- Effect: Addiction leads to serious mental health conditions, including depression and anxiety.
- Impact: Increased healthcare costs, reduced workforce productivity, and greater burden on mental health services.
- Example: Alcohol addiction contributes to higher hospitalization rates for mental health issues, leading to long-term societal costs.
- Substance Abuse and Mental Health:
- Food Insecurity Topic:
- Impact on Children’s Health:
- Effect: Food insecurity leads to inadequate nutrition, resulting in malnutrition and stunted growth in children.
- Impact: Increased rates of chronic illnesses, such as diabetes, and cognitive developmental delays.
- Example: Food deserts in urban communities limit access to affordable, nutritious food, significantly affecting long-term health outcomes for children.
- Impact on Children’s Health:
- Shelter Topic:
- Homelessness and Health:
- Effect: Lack of stable housing increases exposure to physical and mental health risks, such as poor sanitation and untreated mental illnesses.
- Impact: Individuals experiencing homelessness face heightened vulnerability to communicable diseases, chronic stress, and reduced life expectancy.
- Example: Homeless populations often experience disproportionate rates of tuberculosis, respiratory infections, and mental health disorders due to a lack of shelter and access to healthcare.
- Homelessness and Health:
Essence of the Activity: This activity allows students to critically engage with real-world problems, exploring how addiction, food insecurity, and homelessness are not isolated issues but are deeply intertwined with health outcomes. The poster creation and presentation format provides an opportunity for students to present their findings visually and verbally, emphasizing the complex interplay between SDoH and public health. It highlights the importance of recognizing these factors when addressing health disparities in vulnerable populations.
Goals for Students: The primary objective is to help students develop their ability to research, analyze, and present findings on the social determinants of health. Through this exercise, students are encouraged to explore how addiction, food insecurity, and shelter directly influence physical and mental health outcomes. The activity aims to foster a more comprehensive understanding of the broader implications of SDoH, encouraging students to think critically about public health interventions and policies.
How the Activity Encourages Participation: Active participation is essential as students work in teams to conduct in-depth research on their assigned topics. Each group is responsible for designing a poster that effectively communicates their findings, providing both visual and textual summaries of their research. During the presentation phase, students have the opportunity to present their posters to the class, receive feedback, and engage in a class-wide discussion.
- Collaborative Learning: Promotes teamwork and collaboration, allowing students to learn from each other and develop interpersonal skills.
- Critical Thinking Development: Challenges students to analyze and synthesize information from various sources, fostering critical thinking and problem-solving abilities.
- Communication Skills Enhancement: Enhances students’ ability to communicate complex information effectively through visual and verbal presentations.
- Reflection and Discussion: Concludes with a reflection session where students consider the interconnectedness of addiction, food insecurity, shelter, and health outcomes, and explore potential strategies for addressing these critical public health challenges.
Reflection on Outcomes: The activity significantly enhances students’ understanding of how social determinants like addiction, food insecurity, and shelter impact health outcomes. Students demonstrate improved research skills and the ability to communicate complex information effectively. Feedback indicates that the combination of collaborative research and visual presentation makes the learning experience more engaging and memorable. Students appreciate the opportunity to connect academic research with real-world public health challenges, preparing them for future academic and professional endeavors.
Description: This activity is designed to facilitate an in-depth discussion on the intersection of food insecurity, housing instability, and climate change, focusing on how these factors affect health outcomes. The purpose is to help students understand how social determinants of health (SDoH) and environmental changes create significant health disparities.
Students are divided into groups and provided with articles focusing on either food and housing insecurity or the impact of climate change on health. They are tasked with discussing key points from the articles and answering questions related to the topic, encouraging a comprehensive exploration of the issues.
Examples:
- Food and Housing Insecurity Article:
- Food Insecurity and Health:
- Effect: Limited access to nutritious food contributes to malnutrition and chronic illnesses like diabetes.
- Impact: Increased rates of preventable diseases among vulnerable populations.
- Example: The article highlights that people in low-income neighborhoods face significant barriers to accessing healthy food options, leading to poor health outcomes.
- Food Insecurity and Health:
- Climate Change and Health Article:
- Impact of Climate Change on Health:
- Effect: Extreme weather events and pollution exacerbate respiratory diseases and mental health issues.
- Impact: Vulnerable populations, particularly in low-income areas, face greater exposure to environmental hazards.
- Example: The article discusses how forest fires and rising temperatures increase health risks, especially for those already struggling with access to healthcare.
- Impact of Climate Change on Health:
Essence of the Activity: This activity allows students to explore how social inequalities, such as food and housing insecurity, are amplified by environmental factors like climate change. The article discussions emphasize the real-world consequences of these issues on health outcomes and encourage students to critically examine the proposed solutions and interventions highlighted in the readings.
Goals for Students: The main objective is to deepen students’ understanding of how interconnected social and environmental factors influence health disparities. Through this activity, students are encouraged to connect course concepts to real-world challenges, fostering critical thinking about the broader implications of SDoH and environmental issues in public health.
How the Activity Encourages Participation: Active participation is essential as students engage in the following ways:
- Reading and Preparation: Students read assigned articles to familiarize themselves with the topics.
- Group Discussions: In groups, they discuss key concepts and answer specific questions about their assigned topics.
- Insight Sharing: Each group provides insights into how food insecurity, housing instability, or climate change impacts health.
- Class-Wide Discussion: The collective insights lead to a comprehensive class discussion, promoting a deeper understanding of the interconnected issues.
- Critical Reflection: The reflective nature of the questions encourages students to think critically about solutions for addressing these pressing health challenges.
This structure fosters collaboration and ensures that each student contributes to the collective learning experience.
Reflection on Outcomes: The activity significantly enhances students’ understanding of how social and environmental factors intertwine to impact health outcomes. Students demonstrate improved analytical skills and a greater ability to discuss complex issues thoughtfully. Feedback indicates that engaging with current articles and participating in collaborative discussions make the learning experience more impactful and memorable. Students appreciate the opportunity to connect theoretical concepts with pressing real-world health challenges, enhancing their preparedness for future academic and professional endeavors.
Invite Me for a Thought-Provoking Guest Lecture
I welcome the opportunity to contribute to academic programs through guest lectures or collaborative projects. My experience and commitment to fostering an interactive and thought-provoking learning environment can add significant value to your curriculum or research initiatives. If you are interested in discussing potential collaborations, please feel free to contact me.
