Tom Worthington: Teach portfolios without the lingo

Honorary Senior Lecturer Tom Worthington, MEd FHEA FACS CP, from The Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra, Australia, teaches computer science students. He uses authentic learning tasks, in particular around the topic of job applications to engage his students in portfolio practice.
In this interview, Tom shares his own journey from a design portfolio to one for his Master's in Education and what he has learned along the way that is helping him support his students in their own reflective practice without employing portfolio language, but rather using language that has more meaning to his students.
Connect with Tom on LinkedIn
Resources

• Tom's blog posts on his portfolio course ideas
• Presentation 'A job application as the capstone for work integrated learning'
• Professor Dr Stephen Dann
• LEGO SERIOUS PLAY
• Professor Dr Charles Gretton
• ANU TechLauncher
• Awasthy, R., Flint, S., & Sankaranarayana, R. (2017). Lifting the constraints—Closing the skills gap with authentic student projects. 2017 IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON), 955–960.
• Worthington, T. (2019). Blend and flip for teaching communication skills to final year international computer science students. 2019 IEEE International Conference on Engineering, Technology and Education (TALE), 1–5.

Related episodes
The Master in Education at Athabasca University:

• Dr Rita Zuba Prokopetz: Building a learning community
• Professor Dr Debra Hoven: The value of self-reflection and peer feedback

Mike Joiner-Hill: Represent yourself through a portfolio

Click through to the episode notes for the full transcript.

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Production information
Production: Catalyst IT
Host: Kristina Hoeppner
Artwork: Evonne Cheung
Music: The Mahara tune by Josh Woodward