Teaching Philosophy

Kimberly Schutte

I think that the primary role of the university teacher is two-fold: to pass along knowledge and to facilitate learning. To that end, I challenge students to confront alternate historical viewpoints and encourage them to think critically about the evidence and reasoning that underlies those viewpoints. My goal as a teacher is to encourage students to think independently. I aim to help them to move beyond the information they are given and to arrive at their own reasoned conclusions. I believe that effective university teaching is as much about questions as it is about answers, and that it is the role of the teacher to lead students to a fruitful engagement with the material in order to ask, and perhaps answer, meaningful questions of the past.

In the classroom, I use a combination of lecture and discussion with a significant emphasis on written assignments. My role as a lecturer is to present students with the factual information that they need in order to arrive at a firmer understanding of historical events. I also use lectures to model historical thinking for students and to introduce them to different interpretations. Students are expected to participate in class based on their readings of primary and secondary sources. Classroom discussion requires students to engage with the historical material, with me as their teacher, and with each other. I design the written work to help the students improve their analytical skills and to further deepen their engagement with the historical record. I work hard to ensure that students learn that history is argument and that a successful paper is based on a clearly articulated and arguable thesis. Through the combination of lecture, discussion, and written assignments the aim is to ensure that students come away from the course with a firm understanding that history is far more than a chronicle of dates and events. One of my goals as a teacher is to help students to approach the past on its own terms, to understand historical figures and events in the context in which they occurred rather than seeing, and judging, them through the presentism of twenty-first century eyes.

As I have taught an increasing number of students with disparate preparation levels, I have become increasingly convinced of the importance of actively and thoughtfully fostering critical thinking in my students. I believe that critical thinking skills are inculcated through a variety of activities that require students to develop the ability to both read and write critically. I encourage students to take “one more step” when thinking about their sources, both primary and secondary; that is, to think beyond the obvious and to dig deeper for the underlying meaning and importance. In my courses students are asked to engage deeply and critically with the subject

In my teaching I incorporate a wide variety of historical sources to aid students in coming to a clear understanding of the past and the discipline of history. I believe that it is vital that students are taught to make meaning from both primary and secondary sources and to read scholarly writing effectively. Those who make history, as well as those who write it, do not do so in isolation from the world around them. Understanding the social, political, and cultural context in which historical events unfolded is important and it takes a multiplicity of sources to fully convey that context. In my classes students are taught to interrogate such things as works of literature, art, and architecture in addition to documents such as memoirs, letters, political documents, and law codes. It is important that students come to terms with the possibilities, as well as the challenges, of many types of historical evidence.

I believe that it is important to realize as a teacher that most of my students are not destined for a career in history. It is vital that I teach them a variety of transferable skills that will make them marketable in today’s challenging economy. Employers have consistently indicated that they are seeking employees who have strong communication and interpersonal skills. The emphasis on writing, discussion, and co-operative work in my classroom gives these students the skills they will need to succeed once they graduate.

Over the course of a twenty-year teaching career at Missouri Western State College (now University), the University of Kansas and the College at Brockport (SUNY) I have taught a wide variety of courses from the very general World History (both Ancient and Modern) and European surveys to the much more focused upper level courses. This experience has taught me the value of flexibility in approach. Each classroom of students is a unique entity and must be treated as such. Effective transmission of information necessitates the understanding that the teaching method that works well for a particular subject and student level may well not work in another context; however, my long experience has given me the tools needed to adapt to the needs of the students while ensuring that academic standards remain rigorous.