Albion College Education Department
Digital Portfolio Project

Elementary Program

Secondary Program

Students

Faculty & Staff

Interesting Places

The Chronicles of Technology Aided Teaching

Education Dept. Home

Albion College academic programs

Albion College home page

How will I know what to put on my portfolio? How would someone assess it?

A good starting point will be your "paper" portfolio, the big three-ring binder. How is it organized? The organization of your digital portfolio will be similar. However, you have additional tools to use - audio, graphics and animations, video, the ability to present information in more focused segments, and the ability to "control" the time when information is presented. How can you use these tools to allow a reader to interact with your portfolio - your story - to construct new knowledge about you? That is the challenge.

Evaluation of this digital portfolio will follow along the guidelines below:

1. One CD-R containing a digital portfolio will be created in time for it to help you for the job interview process.
2. The digital portfolio will be self-guiding, and organized in a cogent, cohesive manner; for example, your textbook for the course suggests that you organize your portfolio along the lines of "here is the state standard for teacher preparation, and here is how I met/exceeded that standard." It might be good to categorize items included in the portfolio along the lines of personal or student content knowledge, live classroom use, or preparation, planning, and management.
3. Any special player software required to navigate the portfolio, such as Adobe Acrobat, HyperStudio, PowerPoint, QuickTime, etc., will be contained or hot-linked on the compact disc with easy installation instructions
4. The portfolio should contain some or all of the following items (for comparison to national recommendations, see Doolittle, 1994 and Campbell, D. M., Cignetti, P. B., Melenyzer, B. J., Nettles, D. H. & Wyman, R, M. (1997). How to develop a professional portfolio, Allyn and Bacon: Needham Heights, MA:
   • autobiography and resume with credentials and teacher exam results; these can be scanned in or put in your portfolio as portable document files (also known as .pdf, or Acrobat files)
   • a personal statement of teaching philosophy and goals
   • course descriptions (e.g. time, grade, content, sample work); these can be put in as .pdf or put in hypertext format
   • implemented lesson plans, handouts and notes; .pdf or hypertext
   • graded student work such as tests, quizzes and class projects; scanned
   • digital video/audio of classroom lessons; digitized using the Digital Media workstation
   • written reflections on teaching; .pdf or hypertext
   • photographs of classroom activities and projects, student work, bulletin boards, etc.; scanned
5. All components of the digital portfolio should be accessible from Macintosh or Windows computers with a prescribed hardware configuration
6. You will present your digital portfolios to groups of peers and mentors (such as education faculty and cooperating teachers) according to the current practice in the student teaching seminars.

As you create this portfolio, try to be "yourself" in what you do. Our desire is not to create a template to clone AC teacher candidates, but to have YOU shine!

What is a digital portfolio?

What is the Consortium for Outstanding Achievement in Teaching with Technology (COATT)? How can I earn the M-COATT, the Michigan Certificate of Outstanding Achievement in Teaching with Technology?

As an Albion education student, what must I do to apply (application deadline is January 14, 2000)?

What web resources or books can I use or look at to help me get started?

Can I see an example of one of these things?