Dr Moussa Traoré

Teaching Philosophy

A Pedagogy of Empowerment

I am naturally inclined towards the learner-centered approach. In my teaching in Africa,

in Thailand , at Illinois State University and at North Shore Community College in Danvers, Massachusetts, I always put the learner at the center of the classroom activities, by giving him/her a voice in the Literature, Composition and Language classes that I teach. I give a specific importance to Multiculturalism and Diversity and hands-on activities.

The fact that my teaching philosophy is anchored on learner-centeredness does not mean that I accept that the learners do everything they desire. I make sure that learner-centeredness remains separate from anarchy or the blind realization and acceptance of all the wishes of the learner regardless of their relevance and efficiency.

I focus my teaching on the learner’s needs and background, and at the same time, I make sure that the learners acquire some skills that they need in order to become productive members of society. My learner-centered teaching pedagogy is humane and productive.

I put the learner at the center of my teaching in the Composition, Writing , Reading and Speaking in Literature and in Language, in my French class by making sure that the writing prompts are very clear in such a way that each student can understand them, and start work without waiting for me to give instructions, although I always take my time in the classroom to mention the main point(s) on writing prompts, or the main assignment of the day. The use of technology and is also key in my teaching. I use the language laboratory for Listening French classes and the web board for online discussion among students and between the students and me. In this case, my intervention comes as an extra support which ensures that all the students in the class are clear about the task of the day. In the literature class, I also make sure that the syllabus is very clear and easy to understand from the onset.

I subscribe to Robert Scholes’s notion of “the strong reader,” the one who brings

her/ his personal experience into the text in order to make a meaning of the text. I locate the discussions in the Literature class within the broad framework of globalization and postmodernism and I understand these terms as Negri and Hardt define them: the erasure of the barriers between the first, the second and the third world and the implication that such a new dynamics has on notions like identity and nation. In order to familiarize my students with the vision of Negri and Hardt, I expose them to various writings and readings by selecting texts from diverse genres, and on various topics.

I subscribe to Paulo Freire’s and bell hooks’ emancipatory revolutionary pedagogy

which takes into account the student’s background, interests and expectations, while challenging the orthodox conservative banking system of education which takes the student to be an empty vessel to be filled with knowledge by an instructor who comfortably perches in an ivory tower.

Placing the students at the center of my teaching requires that I provide them with the

opportunity to express themselves, in the classroom, and outside the classroom. In the classroom, I make sure that we have regular discussions, at least every other week. I ask the students to turn away from their computers and adopt a conference position, and express their views to the whole class, on a discussion topic that we agreed on, previously. I encourage students to react to their classmates’ opinions either by supporting them, or opposing them (in a courteous and constructive way), or by asking questions to the one who has expressed her/his view. So the students have the opportunity to share views among themselves, while being exposed to dialectical analysis or the habit or ability to perceive different facets in the same phenomenon, in the Literature and Composition classes that I teach.

My teaching of Literature, Language and Translation in French courses to English speaking students is guided by the principle that such students deserve special attention and need to have that conviction that their lecturer/instructor sees them as ambitious and brave students, since they have chosen to study a language which is “generally” perceived to be more difficult that English; then I always point out to them the innumerable opportunities open to them out there , once they get mastery over French, as speakers of English. As someone who has learned English as a Second Language, (since I had the first part of my education in Burkina Faso which is a French speaking country), I experienced the difficulties that the student or learner of a foreign language encounters; I therefore patiently and competently work with students in my French class till they complete their course, successfully. That predisposition has guided my pedagogy in my teaching of French in many institutions: at Lampang Hospital in Thailand where I was teaching French to nurses and doctors, at the University of Cape Coast where i teach Francophone Literature, Bilingual Translation and French Though to Ghanaian students ( English speaking students) and at the University of Winneba in Ghana where I teach Literary Theory to Masters students at the French Department. I also supervised several Masters theses there, in French and Francophone Literature.

Prof. Moussa Traore