Teaching Experience
Brigette Davila
Grand Canyon University: NRS-427V

March 22, 2015

Teaching Experience
Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn, these are the words of Benjamin Franklin. Teaching a young adult church group of African-American young ladies ages 18-25 about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) can be challenging yet, if learning was a success in only one person, then teaching was achieved. In the next few paragraphs the teacher will summarize a teaching plan, evaluate the teaching experience, provide the community response to the teaching, and identify the areas of strengths and areas of improvement from the teaching.
The Teaching Plan
As part of the teaching plan the teacher needs to research and be knowledgeable about the subject which in this case is STDs. After being knowledgeable about the subject at hand the teaching is more applicable to those who will listen. The teacher will discuss with the students briefly what the lesson will be about and will benchmark the students' level of knowledge on the subject. Then will expose the students to the lesson's objectives (Lewis, 2015).
It is also important to identify the type of learners that will adapt to the lesson. To understand adult learners it was imperative to understand the different learning domains and styles and understand how and why adults learn. The domains of learning can be categorized as cognitive domain (knowledge), psychomotor domain (skills) and affective domain (attitudes) (Sincero, 2011). The primary learning styles are visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. The teacher made a pamphlet with information on STDs for the visual learners. For the auditory learners the teacher will engage the ladies in a discussion regarding STDs by giving examples and true stories. The last style is kinesthetic learning, this is where the student learns by experiencing, moving, and doing. Those who learn kinesthetically will fidget and tend to move around a lot, the teacher will provide a welcoming environment by providing food and drinks for those who need to be occupied with something while we are in discussion. Adults retain approximately 10 percent of what they see; 30 to 40 percent of what they see and hear; and 90 percent of what they see, hear, and do (“Adult Learning,” n.d.). Everyone has the capability in learning all three styles, but are usually dominate in one of them.
Evaluation of Teaching Experience
Presenting the lesson to the students was a bit overwhelming because the subject was an uncomfortable one due to the age of the students and due to the fact that the teacher and students were essentially strangers to one another. Walking in a room filled with adults feels different than walking in a room filled with children. Children look up to adults and are eager to learn when the teacher decides what, when, and how the children will learn. Adults are more self-directed learners, they are in control of their learning, and they dictate what, when, and how they learn (AG Discipleship Ministries, 2010). In order for the teacher to be in control and facilitate learning about STDS, this subject must be openly and honestly discussed.
There were eight young African-American ladies sitting and feeling a bit uneasy as to the discussion that was about to take place. Their eyes told a story, out of the eight ladies three of them already had kids and one of them was married. The teacher first introduced herself, by giving her age, her work experience and felt that is was appropriate giving them a little bit of her life story. The teacher explained that she had her first daughter at the age of 17, and did not attend college until she was 26 years old. Raising three kids and being a single parent, it took seven years to start nursing school and graduate in 2011. Opening up to the students created a sense of common ground and this made them feel at ease, and also made them feel that their goals are achievable.
The presentation started off with a game, the game was called “name that disease.” The teacher gave facts about STDs and then said, “What am I?” It was then the students turn to try and guess what the STD was. It was fun; the teacher and the students giggled, and it made the environment much more comfortable to openly discuss a personal topic such as sexual health. The pamphlet on STDs was then passed out, some of the information on the pamphlet answered a lot of the student’s guesses to the game. The session continued with true stories that happen right in the Coachella Valley. The students were astonished from the facts because they were statements that could directly apply to them. They continued to say that, “I am never doing that again” or “Wow, I didn’t know that!” These comments made the teacher feel like the presentation was going well and the students were actually learning something that could help them in terms of their sexual health and well-being. In the end, a lot of questions were asked and answers were given. Answering the questions somewhat put many inaccurate myths and rumors heard from their peers about STDs to rest. A laptop was also present in order to readily research answers to questions that were not immediately known. In this way, no students’ questions were left unanswered.
Community Response to the Teaching
As African-American young ladies and belonging to the African Methodist Episcopal church, their vision is to seek out and save the lost, and to serve the needy (African Methodist Episcopal Church, 2014). The students responded to the teaching better than what was expected. Low participation due to the uneasiness of the subject was anticipated. Once a connection between the students and the teacher was established via anecdotes, the uneasiness was relieved and, therefore, effective discussion about STDs was achieved. The students and the youth group director invited the teacher to return and speak to them again in the future. After many years of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, considerable numbers of individuals still believe that HIV can be transmitted through casual contact, mosquitoes, or public toilets (Lindley, Coleman, Gaddist, White, 2010). The students were grateful for the teaching because they said, they would have not received this much information at their church. Many churches show a disgrace to HIV/AIDS. To effectively address this issue at churches, educational programs must reinforce the ways in which HIV can and cannot be transmitted (Lindley, Coleman, Gaddist, White, 2010).
The students had a wealth of questions and were engaged in wanting to know the answers. It was identified that some have either experienced near misses or have been in a situation that put them at risk for a STD. Others would ask questions but would reference that they were “asking for a friend” or that they “know of a friend” with a problem. This could mean two things: one; they were really asking for a friend, or two; the friend was themselves. No matter who was actually the question the students still left with the knowledge needed to be educated about STDs. Overall the students from the young adult church group were pleased with the presentation and applauded at the end of it.
Strengths and Areas of Improvement
Bill Gates once said, “Teaching's hard! You need different skills: positive reinforcement, keeping students from getting bored, commanding their attention in a certain way.” Strengths that were attained were connecting with the students because they felt comfortable sharing important personal topics and questions. The teaching was organized such that certain points were addressed. During the discussion there was a tendency to go off on tangents based on the questions the students would ask. These questions would lead to stories about friends in certain situations and peer conversations. For example a student kept asking questions about depression that would interrupt the teacher’s train of thought. The best way to address this would be to follow a more detailed teaching plan.
In conclusion, the teaching plan brought facilitated an effective discussion about the importance of being educated on sexually transmitted diseases. At first, there was hesitation in talking about the subject but this was overcome by the use of personal anecdotes that established a deeper connection between the teacher and students. This allowed the students to feel more comfortable asking questions which, in turn, led them to gain knowledge. With this knowledge, the students are now better equipped to make safer, responsible decisions, and maintain healthier relationships in their lives.

References
African Methodist Episcopal Church. (2014). http://www.ame-church.com/our-church/our-mission/
AG Discipleship Ministries. (2010). How is teaching adults (andragogy) different from teaching children (pedagogy)? Retrieved from http://discipleship.ag.org/Help/FAQ_Sunday_School/teaching_adults_different.cfm
Benjamin, F. (n.d.). BrainyQuote.com. Retrieved from http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/b/benjaminfr383997.html
BrainyQuote.com. (n.d.). http://www.brainyquote.com/citation/quotes/quotes/b/benjaminfr383997.html?ct=Benjamin+Franklin
Lewis, B. (2015). Lesson Plan Step #2 - Anticipatory Sets. Retrieved from http://k6educators.about.com/od/lessonplanheadquarters/g/anticipatoryset.htm
Lindley, L. L., Coleman, J. D., Gaddist, B. W., & White, J. (2010). Informing Faith-Based HIV/AIDS Interventions: HIV-Related Knowledge and Stigmatizing Attitudes at Project F.A.I.T.H. Churches in South Carolina. Public Health Reports, 125(Suppl 1), 12–20.
Principles of Adult Learning & Instructional Systems Design. (n.d.). Adult Learning. Retrieved from https://www.nhi.fhwa.dot.gov/downloads/freebies/172/PR%20Pre-course%20Reading%20Assignment.pdf
Sincero, S.M. (2011). Domains of Learning. Explorable Psychology Experiments. Retrieved from https://explorable.com/domains-of-learning