PORTFOLIO

ASSESSMENT METHOD
PORTFOLIO
 Is a purposeful collection of the student work that
exhibits the students efforts, progress and achievement
in one or more areas.
 The collection must include the student participation in
selecting contents the criteria for selection, the Criteria
for judging merit and evidence of student Self-
reflection.
 The greatest value of portfolio is that in building them,
students becomes actives participants in the learning
process and its assessment.
 Portfolio assessment is one of a several authentic and
non-traditional assessment techniques in education.
 The use of portfolio assessment became popular in
early to late 1980’s in response to the growing clamor
for more “reasonable” and authentic means of
assessing students growth and development in school.
For instance, may be in accreditation of experiences
towards a degree.
 1. FEATURES AND PRINCIPLES OF PORTFOLIO

Portfolio Assessment Possess Several Features and

Essential Characteristics.
 A portfolio is a form of assessment that students do
together with their teachers. The teachers guide the
students in the planning, execution and evaluation of
contents of the portfolio. Together, they formulate the
overall objectives for constructing the portfolio.
 A portfolio represent a selection of what the students
believe are best included from among the possible
collection of things related to the concept being studied.
It is the teachers responsibility to assist the students in
actually choosing from among a possible set of choices.
To be include in the portfolio. However the final selection
should be done by the students themselves since the
portfolio represents what the students believe are
important considerations.
 A portfolio provides samples of the students
work which show growth over time. By
reflecting on their on learning (self-
assessment) students begin to identify the
strengths and weakness in their work. These
weakness then become improvement goals.
 The criteria for selecting and assessing the
portfolio contents must be clear to the teacher
and the students. At the outset of the process.
If the criteria are not clear at the beginning
then there is tendency to include unessential
components in the portfolio and to include
those which happen to be available at the time.
The portfolio is prepared at each step of the
process, the students need to refer to the
agreed set of criteria for the construction and
development of the portfolio.
 2. PURPOSSES OF
PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT
Why should we resort to Portfolio Assessment
Methods?
 1st PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT MATCHES
ASSESSMENT OF TEACHING.
 2nd PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT HAS A CLEAR GOALS.
IN FACT, THEY ARE DECIDED ON AT THE BEGINNING
OF INSTRUCTION AND ARE CLEAR TO TEACHER AND
STUDENTS ALIKE.
 3rd PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT GIVES A PROFILE OF A
LEARNER ABILITIES IN TERM OF DEPTH, BREADTH,
AND GROWTH.
 4th PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT IS A TOOL FOR
ASSESSING A VARIETY OF SKIILLS NOT NORMALLY
TESTABLE IN A SINGLE SETTING FOR TRADITIONAL
TESTING.
 5th PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT DEVELOPS
AWARENESS OF OWN LEARNING STUDENTS.
 6th PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT CATERS TO
INDIVIDUALS IN A HETEROGENEOUS CLASS.
 7th PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT DEVELOPS SOCIAL
SKILLS. STUDENTS INTERACT WITH OTHER
STUDENTS IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF THEIR OWN
PORTFOLIOS.
 8TH PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT DEVELOPS
INDEPENDENT AND ACTIVE LEARNERS.
 9TH PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT CAN IMPROVE
MOTIVATION FOR LEARNING AND THUS
ACHIEVEMENT.
 10TH PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT PROVIDES
OPPORTUNITY FOR STUDENT-TEACHER DIALOGUE.
 3. ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS OF
THE PORTFOLIO
1. Cover letter “ about the author” and “ what
my portfolio shows about my progress as a
learner” ( written at the end, but put at the
beginning). The cover letter summarizes the
evidence of a student’s learning and progress.
2. Table of contents with numbered pages.
3. Entries - both core (items students have to
include) and optional (items of students choice).
Students can choose to include “best” pieces of
work, but also a piece of work which gave
trouble or one that was less successful, and give
reasons why.
4. Dates on all entries, to facilitate proof of
growth over time.
5. Drafts of aural/ oral and written
products and revised versions; i.e.,
first drafts and corrected/revised
versions.

6. Reflections can appear at different

stages in the learning process ( for
formative and/or summative
purposes.) and at the lower levels can
be written in the mother tongue or by
students who find it difficult to
express themselves in English.
For each item – a brief rational for
choosing the item should be included. This
can relate to students’ performance, to
their feelings regarding their progress
and/or themselves as learners. Students can
choose to reflect upon some or all of the
following:
 What did I learn from it?
 What did I do well?
 Why (based on the agreed teacher-student
assessment criteria) did I choose this item?
 What do I want to improve in the item?
 How do I feel about my performance?
 What were the problem areas?
 4. STAGES IN IMPLEMENTING
PORTFOLIO ASSESSMENT
STAGE 1: Identify teaching goals to assess through
portfolio
 Organizing portfolio assessment is to establish the
teaching goals.
 To be clear about the teachers hopes to achieve in
teaching.
 Guide the selection and assessment of the students
work for the portfolio.
STAGE 2: Introducing the idea of portfolio assessment
to your class
 Introduce the concept to the class.
 Explaining the meaning of the word “portfolio”.
 The portfolio assessment will assess the learners in a
much fairer way than the traditional testing method.
STAGE 3: Specification of portfolio content
 Specify how much to be included in the
portfolio – both core and options.
 Portfolio entries can take many form –
written, audio, video record, items,
artifacts e.g. drawing, model etc.
STAGE 4: Giving clear and detailed
guidelines for portfolio presentation.
 Present as many evidence of learning as
the students left on their own.
 Explain the need for:
 Clear and attractive presentation
 Dated drafts
 Attached reflections or comment cards
STAGES 5: Informing key school officials,
parents and others stakeholders.
 Make sure that the school principal is aware
of your new assessment procedures.
 It is also a good idea to inform parents about
the portfolio assessment and allow them to
comment on the work.
STAGE 6: Development of the portfolio
 Support and encouragement are required by
both teacher and students at this stage.
 Devote class-time to student-teacher
conference, to practicing reflection and self-
assessment and to portfolio preparation.
 Give guiding feedback
 Ownership: to ensure that the portfolio
represents the student’s own work.
 GUIDE FOR SELF-REFLECTIONS
AND SELF-ASSESSMENT:
 What did I learn from that
activity?
 Which is my best piece?
 How can I improve this?
 Brainstorming
 Portfolio partners
 5. TYPES OF PORTFOLIO
 DOCUMENTARY PORTFOLIO
As the name implies, this approach involves a collection of work
over time showing growth and improvement reflecting students
learning of identified outcomes. This portfolio is called a “growth
portfolio” in the literature. The collection becomes meaningful
when specific items are selected out to focus on particular
educational experiences or goals.

 PROCESS PORTFOLIO
The process portfolio in contrast demonstrates all facets or
phases of the learning process. As such these portfolio contain an
extensive number of reflective journals, think logs and other
related forms of metacognitive processing.

 SHOWCASE PORTFOLIO
The showcase portfolio only shows the best of the students
outputs and products. This type of portfolio is best use for
summative evaluation of students mastery of key curriculum
outcomes.
 6. ASSESSING AND
EVALUATING THE PORTFOLIOS
 According to Paulson, Paulson and
Meyer Portfolios offer a way of
assessing student learning that is
different form the traditional
methods. Portfolio assessment
provides the teacher and students an
opportunity to observe students in a
broader context: taking risk,
developing creative solution, and
learning to make judgments about
their own performances.
 Portfolio include the following:
 Thoughtfulness ( including evidence of students
monitoring of their own comprehension, metacognitive
reflection, and productive habits of mind).

 Growth and development in relationship to key

curriculum expectancies and indicators

 Understanding and application of key processes

 Completeness, correctness, and appropriateness of

products and processes presented in the portfolio.

 Diversity of entries (e.g., use of multiple formats to

demonstrate achievement of designated performance
standards)
 In evolving the evaluation criteria,
teacher and students must work
together and agree on the criteria to be
applied to the portfolio. The criteria
themselves will serve as guide to the
students when they actually prepare to
portfolio requirement.
 students and teachers work
collaboratively to determine grades of
scores to be assigned. In this particular
dimension, rubrics, rules and scoring
keys can be designed for a variety of
portfolio components.
 Each portfolio needs to be assessed with
reference to its specific goals.
One of the more significant aspects
of portfolio assessment is its
“collaborative approach” in which
students and teachers work together
to identify especially to significant or
important artifacts and processes to
be capture in the portfolio.
 7. STUDENT-TEACHER
CONFERENCES
 The main philosophy embedded in portfolio assessment is
“shared and active assessment”. The teacher should have
short individual meetings with each students, in which
progress is discuss and goals are set for a future meeting.

 The teacher and the student keep careful documentation of

the meeting noting significant agreements and finding each
individual session. The formative evaluation process of the
portfolio assessment is facilitated . Indeed the use of
portfolio assessment takes time but in the end it gains.

 Finally, student-teacher conference can also be used for

summative evaluation purposes when the students present
his final portfolio product and where final grades are
determined and together with the teacher. This conference
can be prepared in pairs, where students practice presenting
their portfolio.