Strengthening Rigor in STEM- Student Portfolios

Student Portfolios are a useful tool in increasing or establishing rigor in the classroom.  Through the use of portfolios, students can not only reflect and collect artifacts to display their work, but can also demonstrate their depth of knowledge and understanding of problem solving skills.

There are generally three types of portfolios in the process:

• A Working Portfolio
• A Display Portfolio
• An Assessment Portfolio

A Working Portfolio is just that- a sort of rough draft if you will.  It is a series of work or artifacts that the student may want to include in a final portfolio.  These could be diagrams, writings, or even works still in progress, but is not yet a final product. These pieces demonstrate both student strengths and weaknesses and will help both the student and teacher determine what skills still need to be worked on or refined.  More thought and care needs to be put into selecting the final artifacts that will be included in the final portfolio- a Display Portfolio or an Assessment Portfolio.

A Display Portfolio allows students to display the work that they feel is their best work, most successful project, etc.  Through this type of portfolio, students select a final group of artifacts (from their Working Portfolios) to share what they are proud of.  Careful thought and consideration should be used when selecting these artifacts as this portfolio represents the student, their effort and their accomplishments.  When most teachers think of portfolios, this is the type they usually have in mind.

The last type of portfolio is an Assessment Portfolio and a way to establish or maintain rigor.  Assessment Portfolios are not only to document what the student has learned, but they also contain reflective notes that reveal the student's thinking process about how or why a particular artifact was chosen.  During this process, students think critically about each piece chosen and show how it has helped them to grow.  With the use of these reflective notes, students reach a stage of more complex and purposeful thinking.

By using the portfolio process in the classroom, students can move through the stages of becoming more reflective learners and deepen their critical thinking skills.