The Portfolio...

Below, you'll find a lot of advice about your portfolio. Read it. Your portfolio will count 60% of your final grade, with the other 40% being determined by different factors of your class participation, that is, if you've turned work in one time, how engaged you've been with the process of learning, what you've done to add to the class discussion (both online and in class), if you come to class on time or come to class at all. All these factors add up to a measure of your ethos as a student, and what it boils down to is the evidence you've given me that you've been an engaged, active, caring student.

Your portfolio, on the other hand, is a collection of three elements: 1) a long evidence section which contains the evidence you'll use to support the claims you'll make in the other two sections; 2) your writing inventory, where you'll demonstrate, using examples from your evidence section and your other communication, that you understand the learning outcomes of the course; 3) a cover letter where you will argue for your grade and discuss the most important elements of what you've learned this semester. In many respects, the cover letter and writing inventory function as a job application cover letter and resume; so, you might want to research the genre of the job cover letter and what a resume does for their reader.

Your portfolio will be due the day you would normally take your exam for this class. Your portfolio will function as that final exam. You will turn your portfolio into me at my office, and--at the same time--you'll fill out a class evaluation.

In between now and then, we'll be doing several workshops to prepare you to be able to put your best face forward in your portfolio. As the due date approaches, there will be drafts do, and you'll get reminded repeatedly about the time and place to turn in the portfolio. For right now, read the various posts on the portfolio, and begin thinking about the argument you'll construct with your portfolio.