Hello new readers, new classmates, and new teachers.

I’ve written an autobiography in the past and it is under the about me tab up at the top of this page, but I thought I would take this time to refresh this and reflect on my professional identity as this autobiography was written when I was freshly leaving the heavy mechanical industry and moving into instructing heavy mechanical. Wow – things have changed!

My Autobiography

Through my life I have realized that change is constant. At 13 I thought I wanted to be a Mechanic, at 16 I thought I wanted to be a Network Engineer, at 19 I was a mechanic, and have been instructing for a couple of years now. Who knows what’s next!

In my adult working life I started as an aviation mechanic, but wanted to try new things, so I switched gears a bit moved in to commercial transport and officially started my apprenticeship as a Heavy Duty Mechanic. I was living in Edmonton, but met my now wife, and decided it was time to move back to my home town on Vancouver Island.

I took my first year of trades training towards my Read Seal as a Heavy Duty Mechanic, and at some point through those 10 weeks my instructor mentioned to me in passing “you could do this Kyle”. Unsure of exactly what he meant he went on to say “teach Kyle, I think you could instruct one day”. This put the bug in my ear, but I didn’t think much of it.

After my first year of trades training I realized where I really wanted to be was working on off highway equipment, so I began working in a shop that deals with manufacturing and rebuilding logging equipment for the forestry industry.

A few years of work and trades training later, I was in my final year of training, and my instructor put the bug in my ear again about instructing in the future. That time it stuck.

Professional Identity

I view myself as an equal opportunity educator, and what I mean by that is everyone deserves not only an opportunity, but the best opportunity for them to further their professional self. With that comes the view that there isn’t a one size fits all type of education, every person has different ways of learning, different means of accessing information, different requirements for success.

What I find that often leads to is a student-influenced classroom. The curriculum I teach is mandated by Skilled Trades BC, but that doesn’t mean I can’t step back from a lesson/presentation sort of role and guide the students through their own learning, making sure we hit all the requirements of the Skilled Trades DACUM charts.

In the book The Skillful Teacher by Stephen Brookfield he talks about his truths of teaching. What I take from his truths of teaching is a reflection that even though things may not appear perfect, you are doing absolutely everything you can do for your students to achieve success. Reflecting on my own classroom, one of my truths of teaching is that students will fail assignments, tests, and evaluations. This doesn’t mean that either the student or the instructor is a failure, just that there is more work to be done, likely for both parties.