DAVID ALLEN PARKER portrait
  • Clinical Assistant Professor , Urban Institute for Teacher Education
  • Associate Instructor, College Of Social Work
801-587-8995

Teaching Philosophy

My Philosophy of Education

My role as an educator is to inspire learning through actions and activities which demonstrate that learning is fun, exciting, challenging, life-long, and rewarding. The reward is empowering and may lead you on a never-ending journey of discovery and reflection.

When I look engage my learners, whether basic education or higher education students, educators, or a conference room filled with adult learners, I am delighted with the diversity of persons, personalities, behaviors, interests, backgrounds and styles of learning.  I stand before them not alone but with the collective theoretical approaches of Bruner, Bloom, Gardner, and Piaget, to name a few, as my guides to providing options of how to engage these individuals in learning.

Through the modeling of my own passion, excitement, enthusiasm, and motivation, I engage my learners, encourage them to be creative and have fun with learning, and invite them to reach for their own goals and aspirations.

Two areas of learning that are of great interest to me, and of which I am passionate, are school climate and metacognition. School climate encompasses all aspects of the learning environment. I have identified five strands of climate that include these aspects: leadership, empowerment, environment, relationship, and parental involvement. All must be acknowledged, examined, and addressed in order to have the best learning climate for all stakeholders.

Metacognition is one empowering aspect for all learners. Being aware of how you learn leads to independence and allows for a greater contribution to self and to society.

In conclusion, one metaphor of learning that I hold is that of a banquet table. I believe that everyone should feel welcome at this table. I believe that everyone inherently belongs at this table. Just as a banquet table provides a variety of foods for all appetites, I seek to involve all learners in a rich variety of learning experiences to bring out the BEST in each person.