DocumentingLearning with

DigitalPortfoliosPortfolios must be part of a purposeful assessment

program with clear learning goals.

David Niguidula

Olivia, a sophomore at Ponaganset High Schoolin North Sdtuate, Rhode Island, sat down lastJune with two of her teachers in front of herdigital portfolio—a multimedia, Weh-basedcollection of her best schoolwork. A menu

listing the school's nine graduation expectations, includingEffective Expression, Research Skills, and Critical andCreative Thinking, appeared on her portfolio's home page.The school's faculty had worked for a year developing theseexpectations and aligning them with the state's standards.

Clicking on the link to Effective Expression, Olivia and herteachers reviewed the list of leaming outcomes associatedwith this expectation, including the ahility to express ideasfor various purposes and audiences and the ability to usecommunication skills in each subject area. The screen alsocontained links to about 20 entries, each showing a sample ofOlivia's work that reflected this graduation expectation.During the last two years, Olivia had entered diverse worksamples into her portfolio, including a sonnet, a solution toan open-ended algebra problem, and an audio file of her fluteperformance at the school's winter concert.

Eor each entry, Olivia had written a summary of how herwork met one or more of the school's graduation expecta-tions. Her teachers had assessed each entry using an online

44 EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP/NOVEMBER 2005

rubric and given her feedback, so that Olivia could reviewher work and the comments from her teachers at any time.

This end-of-year review was a chance to look at the port-folio as a whole. By this time, Olivia's portfolio contained twoto four artifacts for every course. The review focused on a fewartifacts that she had selected, each linked to one of threereflective prompts: Where have you done your best work?Where have you grown as a learner? What is your academicplan for next year?

Because Olivia's teachers had been able to look at andcomment on her selected work online before meeting withher in person, they used this meeting to discuss with herwhat she had done well and what she needed to accomplishduring her next two years to meet Ponagansets graduationexpectations.

Making Digital Portfolios MeaningfulOlivia's portfolio review is a snapshot of one moment in awell-coordinated digital portfolio assessment program. Digitalportfolios are multimedia collections of student work storedand reviewed in digital format. Beginning in 1993,1 led ateam from the Annenberg Institute for School Reform and theCoalition of Essential Schools, which researched digital port-folios as an assessment tool and identified a set of essential

As students look through theportfolio and read over theirreflections, they recognize howtheir skills have grown over time.

questions that schools need to address:• Vision: What skills and content should students master

and demonstrate in their portfolios?• Purpose: Why do we collect student work?• Audience: Who are the audiences for portfolios?• Assessment: How do the entries in portfolios reflect the

school's assessment vision, and how can we assess the qualityof those entries?

• Technology: What hardware, software, networking, andtechnical support will our school need to implement a digitalportfolio assessment system?

• Logislics: How will students enter their work into digitalportfolios?

• Culture: Is discussing student work already part of ourschool culture?

Although the technology of digital portfolios has changedsignificantly since the initial research, these questions stillprovide a guide for designing a digital portfolio program. Asthe leader of a team at Ideas Consulting, when 1 adviseschools on using digital portfolios to enrich assessment ofstudent work, I find that technology is the least importantconsideration. The essential element is integrating digitalportfolios into a larger assessment system with clear leaminggoals. To do so, schools need to identify the purpose of theirportfolios, the kinds of work students should enter into port-folios, and strategies for assessing portfolios.

What Is the Portfolio's Purpose?The purpose of the portfolio drives the content. Digital port-folios can serve many purposes: showcasing students' bestproducts; proving that students have mastered expectationsrequired for graduation; and communicating with parentsand other audiences about what students are leaming. Pona-ganset High School is at the forefront of implementing RhodeIsland's "graduation by proficiency" initiative, under whichstudents use their portfolios to show that they are meetingstate standards. Starting with the class of 2008, all Ponagansetstudents will need to demonstrate their mastery of standardsthrough a set of rigorous performance assessments—such asportfolios and senior projects—before they can graduate. Theidea is for students to demonstrate that they can meet stan-dards while also showing who they are as individual learners.

Teachers in the elementary schools of Barrington andBristol-Warren, Rhode Island, use portfolios to communicatebetter with parents. At a parent conference, the teacher callsup the student's portfolio, which displays samples of thestudent's work in reading, writing, and math from kinder-garten through 5th grade. Because the goal is to show growthover time, the portfolio contains only two or three samples ineach subject area for each year.

For the reading component of the portfolios, for example,twice a year teachers videotape each student reading a briefpassage and answering comprehension questions posed byanother teacher. A 1st grade teacher can use the portfolio toshow parents how their child has progressed from strugglingwith a level 5 text in October to confidently reading a level1L text in April. Teachers report that the video componentenables them to powerfully convey a students reading skills;just 60 seconds of video footage can provide the starting

A S S O C I A T I O N F O R S U P E R V I S I O N A N D C U R R I C U L U M D E V E L O P M E N T 4 5

point for a rich discussion of thestudent's progress over time.

What Kinds of WorhShould Portfolios Include?Once a school determines the primarypurpose of its portfolios, it can thendecide what kinds of artifacts studentsshould include. If the portfolio is meantto document how students are meetinggraduation standards, then teachersneed to provide opportunities forstudents to demonstrate their master>'of standards through work that can bedigitally displayed. If the school wants

Schools need to

identify the kinds

of work students

should enter into

portfolios and

strategies for

assessing portfolios.

to show each student's growth overtime, students must arrange portfoliosamples in a sequence that shows suchprogress.

For example, Mr. Sangiuliano,a 4th grade mathematics teacher inBarrington, Rhode Island, wanted toshow student progress in an area hisstudents found difficult: solving open-ended word problems. He taughtstudents a strategy for dealing withword problems: Students restated theproblem in their own words and wrotean "I need to- . ." statement pinpointingthe objective (1 need to figure out how

many fish were caught), followed by a

strategy for approaching the

problem (/ can make a table

showing how many fish each

person caught).To document students'

progress at various pointsduring the year, Mr. Sangiu-liano recorded each studenton video explaining how heor she applied the strategy toa word problem. Videos shotat the beginning of the yearshowed students needingprompting, with the teacherasking, "What was your 'Ineed to. . .' statement?" andhelping students realize thatthere may be more than oneworkable strategy. Videosfrom later in the year sbowedthat these 4th graders hadinternalized the method.

Assembling these videoclips into student portfoliosenhanced assessment in afew ways. As they watchedtheir child successfully usethe same approach to solveproblems invoking different mathemat-ical operations, parents better under-stood the strategy used in class.Second, hecause Mr. Sangiuliano caneasily pass these digital clips on to the5th grade math teacher, work on acommon problem-soKing strategy cancontinue beyond his class. Finally,watching themselves on video helpedstudents re\iew and reflect on theirown growth.

At the secondary level, portfolio-worthy assignments must be clearlylinked to the portfolios purpose. If theportfolio is a vehicle for demonstratingstudent progress toward specific stan-dards, then teachers must give plentyof assignments that tap into the skillsand knowledge represented by eachstandard. Teachers should plantogether how to align their assignments

with the school's overall expectations.For example, several middle schools

and high schools in Rhode Islandassign a geometry scavenger hunt.Teachers give students a list ofgeometric shapes and concepts—such as parallel lines with transversals,similar triangles, or complementaryadjacent angles—and direct them tophotograph buildings or objectsaround town that reflect theseconcepts. When introducing thisassignment, teachers explain that theproject meets the schools expectationsof understanding geometric conceptsand being able to communicate mathe-matically. The assignment could alsodemonstrate successful lime manage-ment, skill in using technology toconvey an idea, and aesthetic talent inphotography

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How Should Schools Assess Portfolios?Successful schools assess each student'sdigital portfolio by evaluating bothindividual entries and the portfolio asa whole. The entire faculty needs todevelop common strategies so thatstudents receive consistent feedback.

Develop schoolwide rubrics. As Pona-

ganset High School developed itsleamer outcomes, faculty membersfound that they needed to agree onhow to communicate about thoseexpectations. For example, teachersagreed that a graduate should be able towrite a good lab report; but what madea lab report "good"? The school'sscience department created a rubricdefining a good lab report as one thatincludes a clear statement of purposeand hypothesis; data in an easy-to-readformat, appropriate to the kind of

information collected; and aconclusion that is clear andconcise and answers theintent of the purpose.Whether a student takeshiology, physics, or chem-istry, he or she has guidelinesfor creating a lab report thatmeets the school's standard.Ponaganset's teachers createdsimilar rubrics for each ofthe learner outcomes.Outcomes such as demon-strating "initiative, responsi-bility, self-discipline, andperseverance" cut across allsubject areas.

Include students' self-reflections- Students' reflectionson their own work are acrucial part of assessment.Students should includesuch a reflection for eachentry in their digital portfo-

I lios and for the portfolio as aI whole. Reflections can bes inspired by a prompt, such

as "How does this entryfulfill the school's expectations?" or"What skills did you use in thisproject?"

The youngest students can reflect ontheir performances viithout writmg.During a •videotaped reading session,for example, the teacher might ask astudent what words he or she foundhard, or what strategies were helpfulin figuring out new words.

When a student has to defend whyan entry in his or her portfolio fulfills aparticular learning expectation, thestudent will more thoroughly under-stand that expectation. When studentsmake a conceptual link between theirwork and school standards, those stan-dards become more than an abstractdocument to hang on the wall. Asstudents look through the portfolio andread over their reflections, they recog-

nize how their skills have grown overtime and begin to see where they cango next.

Generate reports. Teachers and

students should regularly create reportssummarizing the contents and implica-tions of students' portfolios. Digitalportfolios offer teachers and studentsthe advantage of creating reports in anynumber of ways. For example, a Pona-ganset High School junior clicks on thelink for each graduation expectation inhis portfolio and instantly reviews howmany entries he has for each expecta-tion, and which expectations he stillneeds to provide evidence for. Anadvisor then helps this student planhow to fill in the gaps.

Reports of the class as a whole tellteachers a great deal. When a teachercan click on a button and see how allher students did on a particular rubric,she can determine how to adjust instruc-tion. For example, an elementary teachermight use a repon generated bycompiling digital portfolio data toexamine a class's performance on awriting rubric. She might see that certainstudents eam consistently low scores onword choice, a finding that would allowher to focus attention on these students.

In the end, the success of a digitalportfolio relies on the clarity of aschool's learning goals. Although thetechnology makes it convenient toorganize student work and send thatwork to broader audiences, the effec-tiveness of the portfolio relies on a farmore traditional practice: the ability ofstudents, parents, and teachers to createa common \ision. 10

Author's note: For samples of digital portfo-lios, visit www.richerpicture.com and www.efoiiominnesota.com (click on Gallery).

David Niguidula is Founder of IdeasConsulting, 15 Houghton St.,Barrington, Rl 02806; 401-785-0401;david@ideasconsulting.com.

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