Skip to main content

MCC Daily Tribune Archive

Teaching Tips From Your TCC


Portfolio Power!

In the art area, discussion concerning final portfolios takes place almost every day, among students as well as among my colleagues.

Although it is a critical component in teaching the visual arts, the use of portfolios doesn’t have to be relegated to only a few select disciplines.  A final portfolio element can be utilized in virtually any course.  Requiring students to save their best work and include it in an end-of-semester compilation is a great way to encourage them to view their course work in a more comprehensive way.  Also, the awareness of a portfolio component can compel some students to put in an extra effort into individual assignments.  There’s something about the knowledge that a well-written paper could also possibly serve as a strong portfolio item to which most students respond favorably. 

You may or may not be able to draw a straight line (I hear that all the time), but why not encourage your students to add a visual element to their final portfolios?  Something to try might be requiring students to hand in their best coursework, bound in a simple way but with a cover page that the student has either drawn, collaged, or painted that reflects the subject of your course.  Extra points could be awarded for a really creative, skillfully-executed cover.

Submitted by Athesia Benjamin (Visual and Performing Arts)

Julie Damerell
Transitional Studies
03/18/2009