Appendix C: Master’s Research Project- Portfolio Requirements

With input from and subject to approval by your course instructor and advisor:

1. Create a timeline for completing steps 2-10. This timeline should include when you will submit sections of your portfolio to your course instructor and advisor. All work must be completed no later than the last week of classes of the semester in which you intend to graduate.
2. Describe your context. Be sure to revisit the context section to add information over time.
3. Review the literature about each of the required entries related to your area of licensure. Your literature must consist of a good mix of scholarly and empirical sources (e.g., books, journal articles, and other publications of Specialized Professional Associations). Consult your course instructor and academic advisor for guidance about sources. Very limited use of websites is permitted. Use of websites must be approved by your course instructor and advisor.
4. Design, develop, and implement interventions (lessons, activities, assessments, etc.) that can be used to document your practice for each entry type.
5. Begin collecting artifacts for each entry and use your findings from the literature to analyze each artifact to determine how it reflects best practices and areas for improvement. Develop and implement new interventions as necessary. Consult with your course instructor and advisor before proceeding to the next steps.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 until you have enough artifacts or until you are satisfied with your performance.
7. For each entry, write a 1,000-word paper in which you critically reflect on your developing knowledge, skills, and dispositions, and how your practice supports the diverse needs of your students. Each paper must cite the pedagogy, research, and theory you learned during the program (#3). Use the most recent APA style guidelines to format your reflective papers.
8. Write your teaching philosophy statement using what you learned about best practices from the literature and how you have (or will) enacted them in your practice. Use the most recent APA style guidelines to format your statement.
9. Submit your portfolio entries and teaching philosophy statement for feedback from your course instructor and advisor. You may need to revise your work or submit multiple drafts before receiving approval. Adhere to the timeline created in Step 1.
10. Submit your final portfolio to your course instructor or academic advisor. Additionally, submit your reflective papers and teaching statement (Word document or PDF) to your course instructor or advisor who will use an approved OHIO plagiarism detection software to complete the required plagiarism review. Your course instructor or advisor may require changes to your portfolio before approving your work for final submission. 
11. Your course instructor or advisor will share your Master’s Research Project Final Report with the Chair of the Department of Teacher Education for approval.

Elements and Outline

The MRP-Portfolio capstone requirement is a learning portfolio. It provides an opportunity for you to synthesize what you have learned in the Master’s program, show your growth over time, and document the evidence-based practices that you used to support engaged, high cognitive demand, and culturally responsive student learning. The portfolio consists of four parts: Context, Entries, Teaching Philosophy, and References.

Part A – Context

Set the stage for your portfolio by describing your experience in the program, your internship teaching context (e.g., district, school, classroom), and any other circumstances that you believe impacted your performance in the program.

Part B – Entries

Portfolio entries consist of artifacts and reflective papers that showcase growth in your knowledge of students and their subject-specific understandings, teaching strategies, and assessments. Entries also showcase your development as a leader-educator who uses their prior experiences and knowledge of subject matter to develop a meaningful curriculum.

• Artifacts can be lesson plans, assessments, videos, papers, or other projects. They document different elements of your practice and should be selected from different points in your program (e.g., summer, early, fall, spring).
• Reflective papers describe how the artifacts represent a particular type of entry, analyze your developing knowledge, skills, and dispositions, and critically discuss how your practice supports the diverse needs of your students in light of pedagogy, research, and theory you learned during the program. Each reflective paper should be approximately 1,000 words long.

Your portfolio will consist of 6 entries. Use the guiding questions to select and include at least 3 artifacts and one reflective paper for each of the following areas. Artifacts can be used in more than one entry to highlight a different element of practice.

• Relationships and Leadership: What activities have contributed to your development as a professional and a leader? What kinds of relationships have you developed with your students, mentor teachers, other professionals at your school, community members/organizations, and faculty/staff at OHIO?
• Students: What did you learn about your students, their ideas, and how they learn (subject matter, generally)?
• Content and Curriculum: What did you learn about your content and content-specific curricula and how you can use them to support student learning?
• Teaching Strategies: What did you learn about planning and subject-specific instructional strategies?
• Equity, Diversity, and Justice: How did you intentionally create safe, culturally responsive, and challenging learning environments?
• Assessment: What did you learn about different types of formative and summative assessments? How did you intentionally use them in your classrooms to showcase student learning?

Part C – Teaching Philosophy

A teaching philosophy communicates your beliefs about and orientations toward teaching and learning. It emerges as a result of synthesis, evaluation and critical reflection focused on your professional knowledge and experiences with teaching and learning (described in Part B). To formalize this emerging philosophy, write a 1,000-word paper in which you share your core ideas about effective teaching and learning in the context of your discipline; your role as a teacher; the goals/values/outcomes that you have for students; and your goals for continual engagement in the profession. An important characteristic of teaching philosophy is that it also explains why you hold those ideas and beliefs by referencing pedagogy, research, and theory you learned during the program.

Part D – References

List the references that were cited in your portfolio using the most recent edition of APA style.