The 3 influences I will discuss include my previous teachers and professors, my students, and my early teaching experiences. When I think about my own education I have a few teachers that immediately pop into my head. They were instructors that not only recognized me as a student but also as a person. They made me feel important, they had empathy. My students have continual impact on my teaching. I want to know what they are thinking and work to keep the communication in my classroom open, honest and accepting. I came to teaching directly from working in a design studio and had no prior teaching training, so I had to learn the good and bad of my early teaching days on the go. What I learned in my first semester of teaching was immense, and honestly, what helped me the most in my early days was what I learned from my own education and by quickly developing a dialogue with my students to see what was working and what was not.

I see all of my influences having a positive impact on me and my teaching, even through bad teaching days I have been able to see what didn’t work and make changes.

I don’t foresee my future teaching eliminating what I see as influences on my teaching, but how I use them might be different. My conversations with my students differs with every class and what worked for one class might not work for the same course the following semester. So I see myself working to quickly develop an open and comfortable classroom early in the semester with each class so that our communication can be established.