C. Building Student Portfolios

Portfolios are a similar, yet different aspect of performance assessment. Student portfolios are designed to document students' efforts, progress, and achievements. Although they consist of collections of student products, assessments, and reflections, they are not (strictly speaking) assessments. A portfolio is a purposeful collection of artifacts that tells the story of a person and her/his skills, achievements, and/or growth, illustrated by a selection of her/his work. The selection of portfolio content and material should be based upon goals and standards, and it should include a broad range of accomplishments (including products, essays, quizzes, hobbies, etc.). Student portfolios can take many forms, including paper or electronic.

Paper
Portfolios have been created for years by putting examples of student work into folders and notebooks. This is an excellent way of displaying written or graphic skills, and it is easy to measure growth by comparing the work at different time periods.

Electronic
Multimedia portfolios are essentially a combination of textual, visual, and auditory components or artifacts (paper and electronic) that have been digitized for viewing on a computer or other digital viewing device. Multimedia portfolios can be in the form videotapes or files on a disk, CD-ROM, DVD, or the World Wide Web. In some cases, the portfolios are created "by scratch" in a word processor or on a website; in other cases, a school might license a commercial portfolio program/manager. Electronic portfolios often include recitations, reports, presentations, or performances by the students. 

Try This

Read the following article for an overview of student portfolios:

• Electronic Portfolios in the K-12 Classroom by Mary Daniels Brown 

The best way to get a feel for digital portfolios is to examine some real life examples.

• Examples of Electronic Portfolios - Examples of K-12 student portfolios.

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