I believe that to be most effective as an instructor, one must create a safe environment that is interactive and collaborative and that promotes problem-solving and critical thinking skills. A welcoming environment accommodates a variety of learning styles and encourages students to present their opinions while respecting the opinions of others. By giving students a voice, not only do the students benefit from one on one learning by enriching the course material with personal experiences and knowledge, but they also take responsibility for their own learning and, therefore, enhance the integration of their new knowledge into practice. Promoting independent thinking is essential so that students can take what they have learned and apply it in real-life situations. Therefore, I endeavor to make my classroom an arena for students to learn skills and demonstrate outcomes.

Ways in which I help a student become an independent learner: Provide an open environment where students can ask questions, give the student your total attention during tutoring sessions, be flexible with learning styles, adapt to the student's needs, let the student do their own work, allow the student to answer their own questions, use praise to encourage and show the student that they are headed in the right direction, provide the student opportunities to use a resource other than yourself, and, lastly, ask for help if you are not sure how to answer a question.

Praising intelligence makes people less willing to risk "their newly-minted genius status," while praising effort encourages the idea that we primarily learn through our hard work, which is why I will praise effort to stimulate the motivation!

I would identify the lack of understanding and determine whether or not we simply need to review or take a fresh approach to the concept to be learned.

I will start with the fundamentals of reading, and that involves taking words apart and putting them back together to understand the whole. From there, we can then formulate further strategies.