Teaching Philosophy and Teaching Portfolio

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Teaching Philosophy and Teaching Portfolio
Regina Frey Washington University Teaching
Center http//artsci.wustl.edu/teachcen
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Outline

• Teaching Philosophy Statement
• Format
• Questions to ask
• Teaching Portfolio
• Objective
• Concepts to show
• Format
• Compilation
• Materials to include
• Sample Table of Contents

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Format of Statement

• Personal statement on your teaching beliefs
• Reflects your experiences and teaching persona
• Briefly states why, how, and what you teach
• 1-2 pages in length
• Remember the audience of the statement
• Especially important when applying for a position
• Possibly have 2-3 slightly different versions of
  the statement
• Helps clarify ones beliefs and reveals
  inconsistencies in putting these beliefs into
  practice

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Four Points to Address in the Statement

• What are your objectives as a teacher?
• Examples are
• Teach fundamental concepts
• Foster critical thinking
• Facilitate acquisition of life-long learning
  skills
• Develop problem-solving strategies
• What educational goals are not being met today in
  your field? nontraditional people in sciences

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Four Points to Address in the Statement

• What methods will you use to achieve these goals?
• Display knowledge of learning theory and
  curriculum design
• Give specific strategies and exercises
• Discuss appropriateness of collaborative learning
  techniques or group work
• Propose new ideas you might have

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Four Points to Address in the Statement

• How do you measure your effectiveness in
  achieving your objectives?
• Relate to student learning, and student
  evaluations
• Engaging more students
• Develop certain life skills
• Why is teaching important to you?

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Objective of Teaching Portfolio

• Organized collection of materials that reflects
• Why you teach
• How you teach
• What you teach
• Factual description of your teaching strengths
  and accomplishments
• Illustrates and documents your approach to
  teaching
• Based on the portfolio model kept by artists and
  architects
• Not an exhaustive compilation of all the
  documentation and materials about your teaching

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Concepts to Show in a Teaching Portfolio

• Course planning and preparation experience
• Evidence of teaching-presentation evaluation
• Your assessment of students in your courses
• Currency in your field and in higher-education
  teaching field

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Format of Teaching Portfolio

• Table of contents
• An introduction
• Teaching philosophy statement
• Reflective statements for each different type of
  included material
• Selected material on teaching activities and
  solid evidence of the effectiveness
• Note TAs should describe their responsibilities
  in any course included in the portfolio

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Compiling a Teaching Portfolio

• Clarify teaching responsibility in the department
  to which you are applying
• Helps decide the focus of the teaching portfolio
• Think about audience
• Select the items for your portfolio
• Prepare a statement for each item
• How each item relates to overall responsibility
  and reflects status as teacher
• Arrange items in a specific order
• Chronological
• Types of teaching responsibilities

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Compiling a Teaching Portfolio

• Compile supporting data
• If possible, these data should be collected
  through the years at graduate school
• Incorporate (mention) portfolio into CV
• Decide physical presentation
• Tabbed notebook
• CD

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Materials to Include in a Teaching Portfolio

• Course syllabi, handouts, URLs of course webpages
• Student course evaluations
• Faculty or professional evaluations of your
  teaching
• Documentation of teaching-development activities,
  such as attendance at conferences or workshops
• Curriculum development, published articles on
  teaching and learning
• Honors or recognition for teaching
• Descriptions of non-traditional teaching
  settings, such as workshops, work with TAs,
  special or innovative help sessions
• Descriptions of teaching methods
• Advising of students, or extraordinary efforts
  with special groups of students
• Optional Samples of graded work, especially
  written work

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Sample Table of Contents

• Teaching responsibilities
• Statement of teaching philosophy
• Teaching methodology, strategies, objectives
• Description of course materials
• Syllabi, handouts, assignments
• Efforts to improve teaching
• Conferences or workshops attended
• Curricular revisions or developments
• Innovations in teaching
• Student course evaluations
• Faculty or professional evaluations of teaching