TEACHING

My teaching philosophy is based on the provocative believe that we can only learn, not really teach. By saying so I mean that I strongly believe that one only learns when he or she discovers by itself. So the teacher main work will be of opening minds and show the way. As a teacher, I believe that my main responsibility is not to disseminate information to students and evaluate their mastery of course material, but mainly to inspire them to pursue knowledge actively and to become independent thinkers. This superior learning experience occurs only when students assume personal responsibility for their education and is accomplished by creating a positive learning environment that fosters creativity and excellence. This philosophy is concretized in the defense for scientific learning through active student research. Although is undeniable that a solid formation on the fundamental concepts of Chemistry, Mathematics, Physics and Biology is indispensable to the modern Chemist preparation, my philosophy defends that the complete understanding and concretion of these concepts should be carried in an environment of cutting edge scientific research. To do so dynamic research laboratories with material and human capacity to follow these young pupils are needed. The educational process should tend to be more individual, in terms of freedom and responsibility. This process will contribute for the differentiation of the pupils in terms of their skills, tastes and capacities and a dramatic change from the mass teaching typical of secondary school to the a more advanced university level teaching. I consider that only the deep learning of specific subjects, done by individual research projects, can give strength to the general Chemistry learning. I also consider that it is important that well defined and reachable goals are set. By doing so, the students' hard effort to reach those goals parallels with a great sense of accomplishment. My teaching experience, besides two short experiences at the Basic School level, is as Demonstrator for Chemistry Laboratories I, from 1998 to 2004 and as Professor of General Chemistry and Analytical Chemistry Laboratories in 2010-11. My students were first year undergraduates in the BSc (Licenciatura degree) on Chemistry, Industrial Chemistry and Biochemistry at University of Coimbra (Portugal). At the basic level I was a Wood Craft Works teacher in 1989 (7th grade), and a Math, Physics and Chemistry teacher in 1996 (7th, 8th and 9th grades). My experience also includes the orientation of young research students and teaching basic operation of advanced instrumentation. Informal tutoring and advising for graduate students is also part of my daily experience. I usually accompanied young secondary school students in several visits to our laboratory, explaining the instruments and the investigation we are involved. Recently I'm also involved in post-graduation supervision.