TEACHING PRACTICE I

TEACHING PORTFOLIO

INTRODUCTION
Teaching is a lot of responsibility for us, and in order for us to be
better every day, we have to take in consideration the fact that we need
to keep improving ourselves. Being better is not only to know how to
teach, or even to know the exact methodology that we might need to
use with our students, it is beyond that, because it is really important to
learn from our mistakes and try to not make them anymore, and by that,
we definitively are going to be a much better person and teachers in a
near future. The creation of a teacher portfolio is very important,
because it will serve us as a guide to follow in the teaching process, we
must keep it updated, and look at it as a very important tool that we
must cherish and respect. The Teaching Portfolio is also a self-reflect of
the things we did in our past and can tell us if we have improved or not,
that is why is so important to create a Teaching Portfolio. It shows our
flaws and how or what we did to improve in that specific area; also it
shows ourselves out to the world that is going to be reading our Teaching
Portfolio and with this they are going to see how well we teach. Much of
what students learn from their greatest teachers is not detailed on a
syllabus. Teachers who help us grow as people are responsible for
imparting some of lifes most important lessons. During their initial
school years, students encounter, perhaps for the first time, other
children of the same age and begin to form some of their first
friendships. As a teacher, you will show your students how to become
independent and form their own relationships; you will carefully guide
them and intervene when necessary. School is as much a place of social
learning as academic learning, and this is true, not only in our early
years of education, but all the way through college. Though a teachers
influence on the social sphere of school lessens as students mature,
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those early lessons still have an effect on how they will interact with
others in the future.

WHAT IS TEACHING PORTFOLIO?

A teaching portfolio is a record of your professional development
as a teacher. It illustrates your philosophy of teaching and your overall
approach to teaching and Professional development. It is a collection of
materials that document teaching performance. The portfolio is to
teaching what lists of publications, grants and Honors are to research
and scholarship (Seldin, 2004). The teaching portfolio consists of all we
want to teach or deploy throughout our teaching practice; the teaching
portfolio is a documented statement as teaching responsibilities,
philosophy, goals and achievements as a teacher. It is a flexible
document and can be used in a number of ways, depending on the
needs and interests of teachers. It can be an extensive collection of
information, or something much more compact and limited.
It becomes a factual description of the correct activities done by
the teacher and all of the positive things accomplished as well. You will
be able to represent the main purpose of each and every activity done,
as well as the progress that your students live through the great
experience of your teaching philosophy. It can be compared to an artists
portfolio, where the artists leave evidence of all the great artwork that
he or she has created during their lifetime. Or a designer leaving mark of
each and every style they have designed during their career, but not
only to present their final masterpiece; the thoughts and principles that
guided you to get there must be there as well. The road that took you to
that state of reaching your goal must be showed, for others to use as a
guideline as well. (Goodwell, Developing a Teaching Portfolio, 2012)
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SELF-EVALUATION AND
REFLECTION
First able, to design a Teaching Practice we have to make sure to
have recognize all the facts that are going to be involved in our teaching
methodology, as an example: who are my students? What goals do I
want to achieve with them? What is the environment going to look like?
As a teacher, we know that we have to learn from our own experiences,
so we must try to do our best so our students will be able to learn in a
much better way; we ought to bring the ideas that we had in a preview
experience as maybe a trainer or this must be as teachers. Teachers
follow students through each pivotal stage of development. (TEACH
MAKE A, 2013)
It is very important to know about us first, because our students
can see that can trust us, and we can see as the role model they are
looking for that and many other reasons, we should be safe of what we
are to become a better teacher must design a better personality, some
people actually say that personality is something you are born, some
Psychologist personality makes us who we are. I want to make a
difference. While there are many fields in which I could accomplish this
goal, I feel that education is the one in which I can have the greatest
impact. Every day, children around the world are being told that they
aren't good enough, or that they just "can't". As a teacher, I feel I have a
positive platform from which to dispel that fallacy. I realize that teaching
is a profession that can be supremely exhausting, but I know in my heart
that the benefits outweigh the fatigue ten times over. Teaching requires
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patience, understanding, compassion, and enthusiasm; all things that I
am more than willing to provide on a daily basis.

WHY DO I NEED A TEACHING

PORTFOLIO?
A reason why the teaching portfolio is used is for various purposes,
whether they can reflect our teaching methods or as an evaluative
product in which a promotion or a teaching award could be in the
interest of the producer. Whatever the reason of why you are making a
Teaching Portfolio, there are plenty of advantages to see in them. In
simple words they provide information that is very useful not only to the
teacher but also to anyone who is interested in the teaching process. But
in fact that I need the teaching portfolio; first I need to provide
demonstration and testing of my managers and teaching approach. This
involves being evaluated in the subject Teaching Practices but also to
record my thoughts as a teacher, how those thoughts will shape the
learning of my students and help them in the long run. Because it makes
teaching more visible, through the Teaching Portfolio you can actually
see how teaching is being developed through the different evidence
provided by the teacher. It also helps to make reflection on what is being
taught to our students, but it also helps to evaluate how our teaching
methods are functioning.

TEACHING PORTFOLIO

HOW SHOULD I STRUCTURE MY

TEACHING PORTFOLIO?
The structure that you can adopt when creating a Teaching
Portfolio may vary depending on the purposes of why you are creating it
in the first place. It can be significantly inclining to the needs of the
institution that you work for, maybe depending on the institution that
you want to work for. Maybe you want to structure your Portfolio just to
evidence your work as a teacher and what you are doing to improve
your teaching abilities. Your teaching experience changes as your
career progresses, it is a good idea to periodically update your
portfolio(s) in order to keep current with your progress, and to give
yourself a regular opportunity to reflect on your teaching. (UCAT, 2015)
Based on what I have researched, the creation of a portfolio also
helps to facilitate the collaboration of the other co-workers because
allows to discuss the problems that everyone has, they can also
exchange their experiences to share the ideas that they have, so that
together they can succeed in creating a quality education and effective
for their students

TEACHING PORTFOLIO

TEACHING RESPONSIBILITIES
My teaching Responsibilities have the responsibility to create a
learning environment which is able to ensure that their students acquire
the skills and the knowledge they need in a specific area. Teachers
undertake this responsibility within the framework of the law. In El
Salvador it is established by the General Law of Education, where
teachers are required to meet a high standard of professional and ethical
behavior required by the countries law. But to keep an overview of the
responsibilities of the teacher let tilted four very specific responsibilities:

Face to face teaching: I agree as a teacher to maintain a verbal

relationship with the student, using a strategy a roundtable in

class to discuss issues, and hear every one of his opinions.

Voluntary Activities: I agree as a teacher to have the authorization
of the students to do different activities inside and outside the

classroom.
Professional responsibilities: preparation of the classes, marking of
the tests, assessment, meetings, student supervision, reporting
and organizational duties.

These can be considered as the basic teacher responsibilities

although we can go even beyond these when we want to become
exceptional teachers who inspire. (Education, 2012)

TEACHING PORTFOLIO

STATEMENT OF TEACHING
PHILOSOPHY
The teachers I have had, who stand out in my memory have some
attributes in common: they presented their subjects in a way that caught
my interest, clarified difficult topics and led me through complex areas,
and put knowledge into context so that its relevance was apparent.
These role models have influenced my approach to teaching. I view
myself primarily as a facilitator of learning, rather than as an expert who
simply delivers information to students. When I am interacting with
students, I know that each one of them have their own learning stile and
I am not going to force them to learn in my own learning stile, we have
to adapt ourselves to our students, because if we do, we are going to
success as a teacher. Personal contact with students is essential to my
approach. Many of them need encouragement to talk to their teachers,
so I emphasize my availability for informal discussion and my willingness
to help them sort out any problems they have with what they are
learning or any other problem they might have being going through at
that moment. Also I bring a lot of energy to my class. If I can't get
excited about my subject, why should my students? And this is a real
important question as you see. We must keep our students motivated,
because I remember also some bad teachers that I have met in my
students life, and they were as bored as the night; so I decided that I
was not going to be as they were, because I remember being so bored at
their classes that literally fell asleep; that is one of the main reasons why
I believe that as teachers we must keep our students motivated and also
keep them moving inside of the classroom, as a learning technique.
Finally, I aim to encourage a sense of wonderment in the world around
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us, with this, the student will be inspired somehow in the world that is
around him/her, and will use all the tools that have learnt from me and
most important, he/she will be able to use all the communicative
competences that he/she had learned through the process of my
teaching.

TEACHING METHODOLOGY,
STRATEGIES, OBJECTIVES
I would like to be a Good teacher, seriously teacher, that my
students respect me, I would like that my students learn the second
language with different methods such as G.T.M (Grammar Translation
Method), because the most important skills in this method are reading
and writing if students fail these skills, can be reinforced with different
exercises such as paragraph or analyze it, and write it; another method
that could be used is A.L.M (Audio Lingual Method) because the most
important skills in this method are Speaking and Listening, and I use the
speaking and listening to stimulated the hearing of the students for
them to acquire new vocabulary, and techniques that I applied in theirs.
" The notion of communicative competence was developed within the
discipline of linguistics (or more accurately, the sub-discipline of
sociolinguistics) and appealed to many within the language teaching
profession, who argued that communicative competence, and not simply
grammatical competence, should be the goal of language teaching" (Richards,
2006)

TEACHING METHODOLOGY: the structure of my class consists

firstly with a warm-up, asking questions in order to know previous
knowledge about the matter, after that I would like to star with a
previous learning, what the students know about any topic, them I will
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do many activities (inside and outside the classroom) to know what my
students learn the subject, what did not understand and answer their
questions and finally assign some homeworks. "Methodology is the
systematic, theoretical analysis of the methods applied to a field of
study. It comprises the theoretical analysis of the body of methods and
principles associated with a branch of knowledge. Typically, it
encompasses concepts such as paradigm, theoretical model, phases and
quantitative or qualitative techniques." (wikipedia, 2015)
These will be the base Methods to the methodology I will apply in my
Teaching practices. And now I will explain some of the techniques that
will be used and to which method they are linked to. The syllabus
requires students to be able to use the language after the school year,
there for CLT will be the foundation of this Methodology.
STRATEGIES: As a strategy I think using visual tools, for
these tools entirely by students strengthen reading, speaking
and acquire new vocabulary, using diff erent techniques: I use
visual representations of new vocabulary and use graphs, maps,
photographs, drawings and charts to introduce new vocabulary
and concepts; Tell a story about information in the textbook
using visuals Tools; I use visuals that reinforce spoken or written
words. "Strategic teaching is a way of making decisions about a
course, an individual class, or even an entire curriculum,
beginning with an analysis of key variables in the teaching
situation. These variables include the characteristics of the
learners, the learning objectives, and the instructional
preferences of the teacher." (Laboratory, 2015)
Another strategy that I use in the class is discussion: There are a variety
of ways to stimulate discussion. For example, as a teacher begin a
lesson with a whole group discussion to refresh students memories
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about the assigned reading. Other things find it helpful to have students
list critical points or emerging issues, or generate a set of questions
stemming from the assigned reading. These strategies can also be used
to help focus large and small group discussions. "A discussion group is a
group of individuals with similar interest who gather either formally or
informally to bring up ideas, solve problems or give comments."
(Wikipedia, 2015)
OBJETIVES: The main objective pretend that my students
acquire new knowledge and new vocabulary with the diff erent
strategies that will apply to them, they reach the required level,
so they can express their opinions without fear.

Articulate the knowledge and skills you want students to

acquire by the end of the course.

Be a better teacher, with new techniques and strategies, to
merge my enthusiasm and talent for learning and teaching
with students to develop their skills and professional

attitudes.
I would like to devise captivating, fascinating, and unique
practices of teaching that creates interest in the students.

My teaching objectives make emphasizes in both my philosophy of

teaching as well as to discover the potential and knowledge that my
students have, that is why at the beginning of the teaching-learning
process I hope to accomplish all my Teaching Objectives

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References
2015 University Center for the Advancement of Teaching. (2015). ucat.osu.edu.
Obtenido de http://ucat.osu.edu/read/teaching-portfolio
Education, D. o. (2012). Teacher Responsabilities. Northern Territory Government.
Goodwell, J. M. (2012). Developing a Teaching Portfolio. Center for Teaching Excellence.
Goodwell, J. M. (2012). Developing a Teaching Portfolio. Center for Teaching Excellence.
Laboratory, T. a. (2015). T-L-L. Obtenido de http://tll.mit.edu/help/what-strategicteaching
Richards, J. C. (2006). Communicative Language Teaching Today. Cambridge University
Press.
Seldin, P. (2004). The Teaching Portfolio: A practical guide to improved performance
and promotion/tenure decisions. 3rd Ed., MA: Anker Publishing.
TEACH MAKE A, D. (19 de 08 de 2013). TEACH MAKE A DIFFERECE. Obtenido de
http://teach.com/what/teachers-change-lives/teachers-are-role-models
UCAT. (2015). ucat.osu.edu. Obtenido de
http://ucat.osu.edu/selected_links/teaching_portfolio/teaching_port.html
wikipedia. (11 de febrero de 2015). Wikipedia. Obtenido de
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methodology
Wikipedia, t. f. (11 de febrero de 2015). Wikipedia. Obtenido de
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discussion_group

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