Taking Center Stage – Act II (TCSII)

A Portal for Middle Grades Educators

Authentic assessments

According to Grant Wiggins, "Assessment is authentic when we directly examine student performance on worthy intellectual tasks."1 Portfolios of student work over the course of a semester or year provide an important look at student learning. Portfolios are authentic assessments because they show student applications of knowledge in essays, projects, and homework rather than limiting assessment to multiple-choice answers. Teachers who direct students to keep a portfolio of work as part of the final course grade help students to organize their work and to assess their own growth over time.

Portfolios are an invaluable tool in student-led conferences, where students explain to their family members their work and the standards-based rubric scores the work received. In cases where students may not have access to safe storage at home, teachers keep the student work in files at school.

Related Links

• Accountability through student-led parent conferences, Recommendation 11—Accountability, TCSII.
• Student Portfolios: Classroom Uses, (Outside Source), Education Consumer Guide, Office of Research, Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education.

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Footnote
1Grant Wiggins, The Case for Authentic Assessment, (Outside Source), ERIC Digest, 1990.