Materials for Your Teaching Portfolio

Over the course of your teacher preparation program, you will create and collect many materials that you may wish to include in your teacher portfolio as evidence of your knowledge, skills, and attitudes for teaching. These materials should show that you meet the standards for new teachers developed by INTASC, the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium. The INTASC standards are available at http://www.ccsso.org/intascst.html#draft.

To help you begin developing materials for your portfolio, complete one or more of the following activities.

1. Write an analysis of your current attitudes and beliefs about the parents and other family members of the students you hope to teach. Here are some questions to reflect upon as you develop your analysis:
   • What is the best role for you, as a teacher, to take in communicating with students' families?
   • What are the ideal amounts, timing, and methods of communication you would like from family members?
   • How much and what types of family involvement do you expect? For example, do you hope to include family volunteers to help in your classes on a daily basis, do you prefer that family members be involved by supporting students at home, or do you have another preference? Why?
   • What role should students play in getting their family members involved in their education?
   • What do you plan to do when you encounter parents or family members whose ideals for involvement differ from your own? (INTASC Principles 9 and 10)
2. Describe you current philosophy of classroom management. Here are some questions you might wish to consider as you reflect on your classroom management style:
   • What do you believe is the biggest source of behavior problems in the classroom? What can you, as a teacher, do about this source?
   • What are the most effective ways to prevent problem behavior, and which of them do you feel you are capable of implementing?
   • Who should adjust their behavior when the goals of students and teacher come into conflict (for example, when students want to socialize with their friends and the teacher has a goal of helping students to learn to read)? Put another way, when students have behavior problems, is it a sign that you, as a teacher should change what you are doing, or that students should change? How can you tell which problems call for teacher change and which call for student change?
   • List steps you would take to change a student's persistent problem behavior, and the order in which you would take them.
   • In what situations does a teacher need support from an administrator or a student's family?
   • When, if ever, should corporal punishment be used? (INTASC Principles 2, 5, 6, and 9)
3. If you have the opportunity, prepare a videotape of yourself leading a question and answer session with students, classmates, or even friends who volunteer to help you. Use the web links in this chapter and resources and information from this chapter of the textbook to help you analyze your questioning skills. Several sources provide recommendations for effective questioning techniques. Consider the following questions in your analysis: In which of the recommended techniques are your skills strongest? Which need work? What is your plan to improve the areas that need work? (INTASC Principles 4, 5, 6, and 9)