To me, pedagogy is about how an individual can contribute to another’s learning experience. The art of teaching is much more than mere instruction—it is about lifting one’s passion and enthusiasm, one’s satisfaction and love for a field, to a willing recipient. (This last point is important; while the student-teacher relationship is certainly a two-way street, i.e., requiring equal input from both sides, I consider it sacrilegious for instructors to force upon their students unmotivated or dull topics.) My pedagogical philosophy has been shaped in large part by my experience in a homeschooling environment. My father quit his career to homeschool brother and I, a decision which made profound impact on, among other things, my views on knowledge and learning. I come from a technical background; I study math at UVic, and am involved in related fields such as software engineering and computer science, and as such, much of my concern with pedagogy is closely related to these fields. With this in mind, it is my belief that there is little replacement for a close student-mentor relationship. (This is quite rare in an undergraduate education, but entirely standard in a graduate education, a notion which I find sort of backwards.) There, the mentor can provide commentary, rich examples, and historical motivation for one’s field of interest. They can act as a humble guide by giving enlightening examples, problems, and thought experiments, aiding the student in uncovering the relevant problem-solving strategies themselves.

Unfortunately, finding a mentor can be a difficult task, especially early in one’s learning path, when the person is of the highest curiousity and the lowest technical ability. It’s hard to ask questions (let alone good ones!), so often a mentor who is not fully invested in you may have a hard time gaining ground. It may be useful, in this case, to look to other sources to fill many of the same roles that a mentor could. For instance, it is often beneficial to join a learning community of some kind. When I was ten, I stumbled across an online forum where others, roughly in their mid-to-late teens, were interested in computer programming as it related to modifying video games. I kept visiting these forums, until I eventually became inspired to install some software and begin writing code myself. Soon, I came in close contact with these other kids, through the internet, and began participating in a lively community, one where we would all help each other with learning how to code and navigating the problem-solving process. This played an instrumental role in fostering my passion for technical problems, computers, coding, and most of all, learning! If it is not already clear: I am advocating for the constructivist approach to learning; I find it is the philosophy that is most cohesive with what I believe is best for the passionate learner. I encourage everybody to pursue what most interests them, to seek out experienced mentors in the field, and foster a network of like-minded individuals who are on the same journey.