Portfolio Assessment & Conferencing

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Home : 2003 : January : 24

Portfolio Assessment & Conferencing
By Martha

Are you the "Renee" that posted earlier?? If so, I'll try to give you some insight into both Portfolio Assessment and how to do your conferencing. (I can't believe that your distict is expecting you to do this without any
training!) Portfolios are meant to serve as a way of "showcasing" a student's work. It shows not only their abilities, but also their growth as a writer over time. I'm assuming that the reason that your distict is requiring you to do this is so that each student's portfolio can be passed along to the next year' teacher. You'll want to include all aspects of the writing process, such

as graphic organizers, rough drafts, notes from conferences and completed projects. The publishers of books on portfolio assessment usually include sample checklists and rubric lists that you could also include. You will also need to establish a revolving schedule for meeting with individual students for conferencing. The purpose of the conferences is to review and discuss current projects that they are writing on and reflect upon the work that they've already placed in the portfolio. Don't try to meet with all you kids on one day. Try to meet with 3-4 kids per day each week so that it's not so overwhelming. Try to meet during your silent reading time or when the rest of the class is doing seat-work, or when you have an aide in the room (if you have that luxury!) I really enjoyed having the opportunity to meet with the kids one-on-one so that I had a real picture of which kids were getting the concepts and which ones didn't. Use conferencing as a time to talk-through the writing assignment and get an idea of the student's thought process. This would be a perfect time to use the "proofreading marks" and make notes on their draft. You will also have many opportunities to do one-on-one modeling of critical thinking and decision making. I hope this helps. Yes. . .portfolios can seem overwhelming. ..organization is going to be the key. Once you start doing it, however, you will soon see that you've gained a whole new perspective into your students writing abilities!