3.4.5. BENEFITS OF USING PORTFOLIOS

Many teachers initially hesitate to introduce portfolio assessment in the classroom for fear that planning, collecting, storing, and interpreting students’ portfolios will add exponentially to their workload. However, those who have used portfolio assessment suggest that collecting and assessing portfolios typically blends assessment and instruction—without necessarily increasing teachers’ time and effort. But why go through all of the trouble of implementing student portfolios in your classroom when traditional tests have been around for so long to help us assess what students are learning? Robert Tierney, Mark Carter, and Laura Desai (1991) studied the use of portfolios in the local school system for three years before outlining the benefits of portfolios over traditional tests in Portfolio Assessment in the Reading-Writing Classroom. The differences between these two types of assessment can be summarized in the following table.

Unlike tests, portfolios offer opportunities for collaboration among students, teachers, and even parents. To involve students in the portfolio development process, teachers can have students reflect on their work and then ask them to choose their best work for a portfolio. Teachers can also use portfolios to help students understand and appreciate the learning process or to move from pencil-and-paper tests to more holistic assessments.

Assessment reports - As a matter of best practice, or as a requirement of institutional accreditation, study programs must define student learning outcomes and regularly assess the extent to which students are achieving expected learning outcomes for the program. Individual programs, under the guidance of their colleges, may create their own schedules for ensuring all learning outcomes defined for a program are assessed. Assessment reports are therefore of importance. They are usually descriptive and analytical in nature and based both on structured guidelines and rubrics.