A portfolio is a record that your child was educated. It is not a scrapbook of best work, and it is not a performance. Evaluators are generally checking that something coherent happened across the year, not judging whether it was excellent.
Six jurisdictions make portfolios mandatory: Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, South Carolina, Florida and the District of Columbia. Requirements differ, so check yours in record keeping requirements by state and with your state association.
The core contents
Most requirements are satisfied by these five things.
5 things to do
Ticks are for this visit only. Nothing here is saved anywhere.
Include ordinary work, not only the best
The instinct is to include only the pieces you are proud of. Resist it. A portfolio of nothing but finished, perfect work tells an evaluator very little, and can even read as curated rather than representative.
Include something from October and something from March on the same subject. Progress across a year is the single most persuasive thing a portfolio can show, and it is invisible if everything came from the same two weeks.
What to keep per subject
A rough guide. Adjust to what your state asks for.
Maths
- Worth keeping
- Worked problems showing method, not just answers
- How often
- A few pieces per term
Writing
- Worth keeping
- A first draft and the final version of the same piece
- How often
- Two or three per year
Reading
- Worth keeping
- A running list of books, finished and abandoned
- How often
- Ongoing
Science
- Worth keeping
- Photographs of experiments, plus what was concluded
- How often
- Per topic
History and humanities
- Worth keeping
- Anything with a date and an argument in it
- How often
- Per topic
Art and practical
- Worth keeping
- Photographs, since the work itself rarely fits in a folder
- How often
- As produced
| Subject | Worth keeping | How often |
|---|---|---|
| Maths | Worked problems showing method, not just answers | A few pieces per term |
| Writing | A first draft and the final version of the same piece | Two or three per year |
| Reading | A running list of books, finished and abandoned | Ongoing |
| Science | Photographs of experiments, plus what was concluded | Per topic |
| History and humanities | Anything with a date and an argument in it | Per topic |
| Art and practical | Photographs, since the work itself rarely fits in a folder | As produced |
Abandoned books belong on the reading list
A reading log that only contains finished books is a less honest record and, oddly, a less impressive one. A child who is allowed to stop reading something is a child who keeps starting things.
Note what was abandoned and roughly why. It shows judgement developing, which is a more interesting thing to evidence than volume.
Build it as you go, or it will not exist
The failure mode is universal: nothing is kept until spring, and then a weekend disappears into reconstructing a year from undated worksheets and memory.
A folder per child and a habit of dropping things in as they happen is enough. It does not need a system. It needs to take under a minute so it survives a bad week.