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Teaching Statement in Thirteen Images

By Brandon Walsh on

Crossposted to Brandon's blog.

As part of the final unit in the Praxis curriculum each fall our students extensively discuss teaching and learning in digital humanities. As a way of putting these conversations into practice, they develop two outcomes: a speculative, minimal DH workshop related to their research and a teaching philosophy statement related to their newfound interests in digital pedagogy. It’s been years since I’ve put together a formal teaching statement (unless you count the various student charters on the Scholars’ Lab website), so I had planned on joining the students in their writing process and producing a statement of my own to share with them. Things got away from me, though, as my wife and I just moved and are also preparing for our first baby. I didn’t have the mental wherewithal to devote to this task, but I thought I’d spin up something quickly in the same spirit.

I’m sharing this post as a creative spin on the genre: my teaching statement in thirteen images (thirteen because that’s the Praxis cohort we’re currently running). Consider it a visual collage of how I approach working with students in and out of the classroom. I used unsplash, a great source for open and free images, to search for keywords that were meaningful to my digital pedagogy. I won’t explain them beyond describing the pictures in alt-text. Instead, I think they’re useful to meditate on for yourself. When you teach, what do you see?

  1. Water droplets on green leaves. Photo by Tahlia Doyle.
  2. Mountain with trees under white stars at night. Photo by Nathan Anderson.
  3. Rocks stacked on a rocky beach. Photo by Rob Wicks.
  4. Girl playing guitar near wall. Photo by Felix Koutchinski
  5. White butterfly resting on cat's nose. Photo by Karina Vorozheeva
  6. Person touching body of water and creating ripples. Photo by Nick Moore.
  7. Person in black jacket standing in front of aquarium with fishes. Photo by Sam Chang.
  8. "Together we create" graffiti on wall in black and white paint. Photo by user bamagal
  9. Assorted colored paint bottles on top of floor covered in splattered paint. Photo by Ricardo Viana
  10. Person with hands extended. In one, mirror shards. In the other, a complete round mirror. Photo by Jeremy Yap.
  11. Green grass and trees in the woods during daytime. A path runs through them. Photo by Clay Banks.
  12. Various feet in shoes hanging over wall, photographed from bottom. Photo by James Baldwin.
  13. Black rabbit on green field under off-white sky during daytime. Photo by Julian Hanslmaier.
Brandon Walsh is Head of Student Programs in the Scholars’ Lab.
Cite this post: Brandon Walsh. “Teaching Statement in Thirteen Images”. Published January 09, 2024. https://scholarslab.lib.virginia.edu/blog/teaching-statement-in-thirteen-images/. Accessed on .