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thought leader is to develop a ‘personal teaching philosophy’. A personal teaching

philosophy “is a purposeful and reflective essay about your teaching beliefs and
practices. It is an individual narrative that includes not only your beliefs about the

teaching and learning process but also concrete examples of the ways in which you
enact these beliefs in the classroom.” (Cox, 2019).

Why do you need a PTP? A PTP is your chosen recipe for learning. It is true that the

theories about learning have their place in your teaching practice. For example, a

novice teacher might start with a behaviourist teaching style and slowly develop
towards a constructivist approach. Mostly, by formulating your personal beliefs about

learning, you are creating your teaching compass. This compass will determine your
choice of pedagogy in the classroom. Pedagogy is defined as “ … word of Greek

origin made up of ‘paidos’ (child) and ‘agogos’ (leader.) This one word describes the
study of teaching and how content is presented and delivered to a learner. It is the

creation of an educational process that leads to knowledge gain in the

learner….Pedagogy in education describes the carefully thought-out process a
teacher will use to teach their students, taking into account prior learning, classroom

context, end goals and more.” (Barton 2019).

No doubt, as mentioned, your PTP will change throughout your teaching years, and

this “view” will need to be revised – a PTP should be a living document. Writing it
down also allows you to share your views easily with colleagues and students. More

importantly, the process of articulating your beliefs about teaching and learning in
writing will help you to better (and more efficiently) design syllabi, assignments and

class activities.

Reading Task

Read this article, What's Your Philosophy on Teaching, and Does it

Matter?, to gain more insight into the purpose of a PTP.

The mind map on the following page is a great representation of a PTP.

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