by Paul Ruth

Created on: April 24, 2008

A portfolio is basically an assessment. It would be considered as a non-traditional form of assessment. Assessment main function is to measure what has been learned. It is true that assessment can vary for purpose and content area. Portfolios are great for assessing a displayed skill on a certain content. One example would be interpreting poetry. Students might have to select six poets ans interpret a poem from each using a certain formate. This allows them to apply the skill of interpreting poetry with an expanding content knowledge of various poets. There are though great things about portfolios and somethings that can create some justified resistance to them.

The positives of having students do portfolios are many. For instance, a portfolio can allow a students to independently explore a certain subject as far as they desire to go. This is great for the gifted students in a class because it give them a chance to show how much they can do. Portfolios have the ability to cover content to the extent that other types of assessment cannot. Like in the example above, the student would be able to become comfortable and be in depth with six different poets, whereas with a traditional test the student may only get to explore two to three poets because of limited time and space on the test. The portfolio can also give more relevance and validity to the student in that content area. The student is able to see physically how much her or she has done rather than it just being a number.

On the other hand there can be some drawbacks to portfolios. For one, they can be very lengthly to grade. Especially if the teacher is focused on grading for exact answers. (This might be why portfolios may not be the best choice for math and science.) The portfolio can become overwhelming not just for the students and the amount of work they have to do, but they may take over the entire instruction of the class. Students also may tend to get a 'get it done and over with mentality', which leads to poor quality and lack of true assessment as a completion grade.

All in all, portfolios have their place. It takes the reliance on the professionalism of the educator to know hen they are appropriate.

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