The Portfolio Assessment Guide is a free, web-based tutorial designed to guide educators in creating and implementing a standards-based, foreign language portfolio assessment tied to their own curricula. It includes teacher and student questionnaires, FL standards checklists, planning worksheets, sample rating scales, self-assessment activities, and sample lessons.

The Portfolio Assessment Guide is the result of a three-year project (1996-1999) on the use of portfolios as an assessment measure in elementary through post-secondary foreign language classrooms. This project included the writing, pilot testing, evaluation, and revision of this manual as well as development and delivery of professional development activities at the K-12 and higher education levels on classroom portfolio assessment for foreign language educators.

Portfolio assessment is the systematic, longitudinal collection of student work created in response to specific, known instructional objectives and evaluated in relation to the same criteria. Assessment is done by measuring the individual works as well as the portfolio as a whole against specified criteria, which match the objectives toward a specific purpose. Portfolio creation is the responsibility of the learner, with teacher guidance and support, and often with the involvement of peers and parents. The audience assesses the portfolio.

Portfolios have generated a good deal of interest in recent years, with teachers taking the lead in exploring ways to use them. We welcome you to begin or continue your own exploration through the use of this guide.

Click here to access the Portfolio Assessment Guide.