Writing Program at New College
Assignments - Portfolio and Final Reflection
The final assignment this semester is the New College Writing Portfolio. Our version of the typical portfolio will provide students an opportunity to review work completed in the course, and then to reflect on that work as well as on their own progress as critical thinkers and writers. As with most portfolios, this one builds on your strongest work in order to demonstrate the scope, depth, and quality of your learning for the semester.
Specific goals for the ePortfolio are to:
1. Demonstrate your abilities as a critical thinker, reader, and writer.
2. Share your work with a broader academic audience.
3. Facilitate assessment from you and your instructor.
The portfolio will use the Digication ePortfolio platform, and it will have seven (7) distinct sections:
1. Welcome Page
The Welcome page offers a general greeting and introduction to the ePortfolio.
2. About Me
The About Me page is where you provide readers with information about yourself. Tell us your name, where you’re from, your major, and the like. Include at least one picture. Create the page in a way that captures at least some of your personality.
3. Project One – Rhetorical Success Narrative
In the space provided for the first project, students will upload the most recent and revised version of the essay as well as an introduction to that essay.
For the introduction to Project One, write about the processes used to consider, draft, and revise the Rhetorical Success Essay. But more than simply listing these steps, discuss how using these different skills helped to produce the final project. In other words, what worked best? What did not? How so? Why? What in the final essay demonstrates process work?
Other questions to consider: How many drafts did you write? How did prewriting exercises help you discover and/or develop ideas? What did you learn from watching How Schools Kill Creativity? What strategies were developed from reading sample essays: “The Art of Eating Spaghetti,” “What is a Hunter?” and/or “Bees, Doors, and Skates”? What kinds of peer review or other collaborative feedback helped you in revisions? How so?
A clean PDF of the most recent version of the essay should be uploaded after this introduction.
4. Project Two – How Am I Connected?
In the space provided for the second project, students will upload the most recent and revised version of the essay as well as an introduction to that essay.
For the introduction to Project two, write about how you used skills associated with Rhetorical Knowledge to consider, draft, and revise the Connection Essay. But more than listing steps associated with Rhetorical Knowledge, discuss how using different subset skills helped to produce the final project.
In other words, tell readers about the purpose of the essay and how well you feel your essay fulfilled that purpose. Explain how you took readers into consideration while writing. Identify places in the essay where you had to revise or restate things for an unknown audience. Discuss how writing a narrative and telling a story impacted what you shared and/or how you shared it. Describe how readers know you are writing a narrative and not any other kind of essay – informative, descriptive, and/or persuasive essay, for instance.
A clean PDF of the most recent version of the essay should be uploaded after this introduction.
5. Habits of Mind
According to the WPA, “habits of mind refers to ways of approaching learning that are both intellectual and practical and that will support students’ success in a variety of fields and disciplines” (Framework for Success). In this section of the portfolio, you will discuss what each of these habits means to you as well share instances of where and how you used these ways of approaching learning.
6. Final Reflection
You will conclude with a letter to your instructor that offers a critical self-assessment of the work included in the portfolio and you experiences as a writer in the class. Your goal is to examine and reflect on your work in the course and to discuss how you see yourself as a writer and thinker, now, at the end of the course.
Even though you are writing a letter, the writing should be polished and focused, with claims supported by specific evidence and discussion. The letter should also be at least 500 words. Your final reflective letter should take the following into account, but not in sum and not necessarily in this order:
- The significance of the individual touches you have added to the portfolio.
- What you know understand about effective writing – how it is achieved and what in your portfolio demonstrates this effectiveness. (Refer to something in one of the essays included in the portfolio.)
- What you now understand about critical thinking and writing that work in this portfolio might not reveal. In other words, maybe you understand the point more than the essays reveal.
- What the portfolio does reveal about you as a critical thinker and writer. In other words, how do your essays paint you as a critical thinker and writer right now?
- What two Habits of Mind you found most useful and why. How will these skills help you in other classes? Outside of class?
- Where do you need to improve? Discuss the challenges that you continue to face and the steps you have taken to improve in these areas?
- And finally, conclude the letter with a discussion about the extent to which you were actively engaged in the course. How much time and effort did you put into the course? Does your writing reflect that effort? What would you do differently?
7. Contact Me Page