Teaching Philosophy

Named a Dr. Martha Kirkland West Teaching Scholar by Catawba College's Shirley Peeler Ritchie Academy for Teaching, Caleb is a strong advocate for arts education in modern classrooms as a form of therapeutic recreation and academic enhancement through problem-based learning. Caleb regards Theatre Educators as reflective practitioners who are able to prepare a diverse group of students for an ever-changing global society through the education of students and the enhancement of his own education. Believing that content fluency is acquired through personal experience, Caleb strives to teach and observe media, visual, aural, and critical literacies through a personal approach and a multimodal lens. Caleb's understanding of pedagogy is one of cultural and civic responsibility: Education should challenge the institutional, personal, and instructional dimensions of the classroom.  As a result, students and teachers are socialized to a multicultural norm, having learned acceptance and respect for other people whose culture differs from our own, bringing an awareness to our shared history and our personalized history according to our individual social contexts.