Tips and tools for digital teaching and creating teaching portfolios

Here’s a short summary I co-wrote with Céline Fernandez compiling the highlights of our November meeting for the LuPOD professional development program. ​

Image from https://www.roberthalf.com/creativegroup/blog/how-to-put-together-your-first-professional-portfolio

Tools for digital learning:

• Voto.se: to create quiz and have participants voting in real time

• Kahoot: to create learning games​

Best practices for films for educational purposes:

• Max length: 5 min
• Availability: no more than 2 clicks to access
• Sound quality is important to the viewer
• Think about the voice melody of the speakers (no monotonous tone)
• Lifetime: since the film will most probably remain on the web for a long time, use a layout that is likely to age well   

 
Issue regarding available learning material online: often no quality control. Therefore, make sure to review material before assigning, point out to students to be critical when using information online, and consider making your own material.
 
 
Teaching portfolios

• Why you need one: it helps you document and reflect on your teaching, and may be required for application to positions (e.g., lecturer or docent) or for merits like the Pedagogical Academy/Excellent Teaching Practitioner.
• Get a model: Applications for positions (such as Docent) at Lund University are public documents and should be available on request. These are valuable to study when working on your own application. Also ask colleagues to share their successful applications for inspiration.
• Pedagogical philosophy: Get beyond buzzwords from LATHE courses and show how you expressed pedagogical ideas in practice.
• Pedagogical reflection: Give both good and bad examples from your teaching practice to demonstrate your own reflection and development.

• Scholarship of teaching and learning: taking an investigative approach to teaching and learning, applying an iterative cycle of reflection and improvement.

 
References and further reading:

• Application for Excellent Teaching Practitioner at Lund University, including instructions for the teaching portfolio required, are listed by faculty. Here are links to the Social Science Faculty and LTH, which were easy to find in English on the Lund website. :)