Learning without reflecting on how, what, and why we are learning is meaningless. In First Year Writing, we believe that a digital portfolio is the best platform — like a dot-connecting mechanism — for supporting your reflections.
Due Date: during our scheduled final-exam periods, when we will meet for the final, official delivery of your WRD103 Portfolios
— Section #129: Tuesday, March 18th, 8:45-11:00 a.m.
— Section #130: Tuesday, March 18th, 11:45-2:00 p.m.
Audience: Instructor, Classmates, WRD/FYW administrators, university assessment committees
A Note on Reflection
Reflection refers to the iterative process that we engage in when we want to look back at some activity or decision we’ve made, to think about what we’ve learned from it, and how we might use it in the future. Reflection is a powerful tool in teaching and learning — think of it as a dot-connecting mechanism — and outside of academics, reflecting is a common tool among professionals and organizations as a way to establish values, goals, and future actions:
• What did I do? What is significant about it?
• Did I meet my goals?
• When have I done this kind of work before? Where could I use this again?
• Do I see any patterns or relationships in what I did?
• How well did I do? What worked? What do I need to improve?
• What should I do next? What’s my plan?
Reflection is also challenging: by its own nature, it requires honesty, self-awareness — what some people call meta-awareness or metacognition — and the ability to think critically about the conditions of our work and its outcomes.
For your WRD103 digital portfolio, I have created a basic Digication portfolio with a recommended organizing principle. In a new Digication site, you’ll include:
- A synthesis and reflective essay, in which you theorize yourself as a writer and show how you met the course requirements for thinking, critical thinking, perplexity, and your contributions to the intellectual life of our class [500-750 words]
- Your revised Op-Ed essay and extended process description
- A work showcase
- A reflection on your experience with the New York Times, in which you consider Arthur Miller’s observation that, “A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself.” [250 words +/-]
Planning notes
- Portfolio FAQ brainstormed in class
- Your Op-Ed sound cloud recording can be integrated either in your Synthesis & Reflection Essay or in your Process Description, wherever you think it makes most sense for readers to hear it, and where you find it most useful for addressing it in your reflections
- You are welcome to keep the Depaul Digication banner, as it comes with its own design sensibility and the Tree of Wisdom. If you prefer to replace it, you will need to create your own image; avoid Google image searches.
- Digication: get help
- Portfolio showcase
- Embedded links: great example
- How are your portfolios assessed? Click the image below:
