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Description: A portfolio is a collection of information that documents a student's academic accomplishments. Purpose: Portfolios represent a form of alternative assessment that is even less structured than performance tests. They are primarily intended to serve instructional purposes and their assessment value is secondary to their instructional role. The portfolio should not be a collection of things, but should instead be a deliberate, specific collection of material that tells a story about a student's development over a long period of time. It should be a longitudinal portrait of student progress from many different perspectives. Pros: Most of the contents of the portfolio are actual pieces of student work, not approximations supplied by a score on a standardized test. Portfolio assessment makes assessment an integral part of the learning process. Suggestions for use: Criteria have been established for evaluating the usefulness of portfolios and specifying what they should contain. They generally agree that a good portfolio should include the following:
The portfolio as an Assessment Tool: The portfolio is a subjective method of conducting as assessment, but it can be made more objective, if that is desired, by standardizing its content. However, this makes the portfolio less useful for other purposes. The most important limitation of the portfolio as an assessment tool is the difficulty in ensuring that the contents of a portfolio represent the student and his or her characteristics alone. This will seldom be a problem for the teacher using the portfolio to assess classroom progress, but it can, and most likely will be a problem when the teacher is being evaluated on the portfolio of the student. When the portfolio is used instructionally, the teacher will usually know the students well and be in a favorable position to judge how accurately the contents of the portfolio reflect the student's level of performance. Portfolios work best when students are responsible for how much they learn and the teacher is responsible for monitoring this learning. Under these circumstances portfolios can help provide students with a sense of responsibility about their accomplishments. On the other hand, when the teacher is given the responsibility for helping students assemble their portfolios and is in turn evaluated by the same portfolios, the evaluative value is likely to be compromised. The more pressure that is put on teachers to have their students produce better portfolios, the more tempting it will be for them to exert too much effort improving their student's portfolios. The teacher might make suggestions about the content of the explanatory material that a student provides to indicate his or her capacity to engage in self reflection, or they could "help" students transfer their material onto a computer and have it printed, or they could key in the material themselves. As more student work requires the use of computers, it will become increasingly difficult to pinpoint authorship of student work. Uses: The information gathered in the portfolio can be used to measure students’ progress and growth in their understandings, skills and attitudes. It can be used to show evidence of the student development to students, and future employees. This evidence can be in the form of –
All these forms of evidence are to be used to exhibit the student’s skill, knowledge, and/or attitude in the course. Possible portfolios can include evidence of skills in the following areas:
Possible factors that will go into evaluating the portfolio:
*The five C’s of Portfolio Development: There are at least five fundamental uses of portfolios: Celebration: To acknowledge and validate students’ products and accomplishments during the year Cognition: To help students reflect upon their own work Communication: To let parents, administrators, and other teachers know about students’ learning progress Cooperation: To provide a means for groups of students to collectively produce and evaluate their own work Competency: To establish criteria by which a student’s work can be compared to that of other students or to a standard or benchmark. *Adapted from Multiple Intelligences in the Classroom (pp128, 129), by T Armstrong, 1994. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. *What to put in an Multiple Intelligence Portfolio: To document linguistic intelligence:
To document logical-mathematical intelligence:
To document spatial intelligence:
To document bodily-kinesthetic intelligence:
To document interpersonal intelligence
To document intrapersonal intelligence
* Adapted from Multiple Intelligences in the Classroom (pp128, 129), by T Armstrong, 1994. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Evaluation Context Because the materials in the portfolio have been collected over a period of time, the student's progress can be judged in a way few other assessment techniques can offer. Reviewing the materials at the end of the course is like looking at a set of photographs taken during a child's developmental years. The portfolio has long been used by art educators and is gaining popularity in language arts. It is sufficiently versatile to be used in other subject areas, too. Its particular strengths lie in allowing you to evaluate students on developmental patterns and on attributes such as creativity and critical thought, responsibility for learning, research skills, perseverance, and communication skills. Guidelines for Use The portfolio is more than a collection of student work. Before the portfolio is begun, inclusion rules need to be established. Some decisions are:
The answers to these inclusion rules will provide the framework within which you and the student can operate. Since the purpose of the portfolio is to record student progress over a long time period, the collecting should be started as early in the course as possible. Baseline data is particularly valuable. Subsequent additions should be made according to the prearranged framework, always allowing for unexpected additions, of course. There are really three phases in the development of a portfolio.
This phase has been covered above. Decisions need to be made and agreed upon with your students.
Throughout the span of the portfolio, place the selected materials in a folder or large envelope. Each item should be dated and have a note attached to it from yourself or the student stating why the material was chosen and what special features should be recalled later. If you are unfamiliar with the use of portfolios, you may find that it is hard to come up with many portfolio items. Start by including traditional products such as tests. As you gain familiarity with the technique, you will find yourself designing assignments that fit the portfolio mode. A biology assignment might be to review a 'Nova' or 'Nature of Things' television program; a math assignment might be to write a story of a world with no zero in its numbers.
When the portfolio is complete, you will need to examine the contents once again. One method is to prepare a grid with the list of attributes you decided to evaluate written down one edge and a Likert-type scale (e.g., very good/good/average/ poor/very poor) across the top. Complete the grid. A complete grid will provide a rich array of assessment information. Hints
Before the portfolio is begun, inclusion rules need to be established. Some decisions are:
The answers to these inclusion rules will provide the framework within which you and the student can operate. Before the portfolio is begun, inclusion rules need to be established. Some decisions are:
The answers to these inclusion rules will provide the framework within which you and the student can operate. Before the portfolio is begun, inclusion rules need to be established. Some decisions are:
The answers to these inclusion rules will provide the framework within which you and the student can operate. Samples of work completed on an individual basis may be included along with work completed in groups. Copies of self-assessment instruments and peer-assessment instruments may also become part of the portfolio. Summary: Portfolios are a form of alternative assessment that is even less structured than performance tests. Students need to understand the purpose of the portfolio, the degree to which they are being evaluated by it, who will be examining their portfolios and the reasons for this examination. In a well-designed portfolio the student selects the pieces of work to be included in the portfolio. The student has a chance to revise it, perfect it, evaluate it, and explain it. It is different from work completed just to fulfill an assignment or written only for the lecturer's eyes; a piece created for the portfolio bears a piece of the student's identity. It represents the student in a concrete and authentic way that a score cannot do.
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Number of
entries
Who will
decide what to include? Student? Teacher? Both, working in consultation?
Before the collection begins
Limit the
number of items or storage could become a problem. If you find you have too many items,
leave out things like quizzes or final exams, which do not fit the portfolio philosophy
that emphasizes work, created by the student.
Who will
decide what to include? Student? Teacher? Both, working in consultation?
Who will
decide what to include? Student? Teacher? Both, working in consultation?
Who will
decide what to include? Student? Teacher? Both, working in consultation?
