Synopses & Reviews
At professional conferences, educational experts recommend portfolios as alternatives to grading. Professional journals recognize portfolios as new systems for evaluating teacher and student performance. Several states are using portfolio assessments for entire school populations.
Portfolio Portraits offers unique "portraits" of portfolio keepers-from first graders to university sophomores and graduate students, from teachers in graduate classes to administrators in public schools-as they learn how to use portfolios, and the reader views that learning process. The book is divided into three sections. The first offers portraits of classrooms working with portfolios. The second makes some broader observations of portfolio keeping itself-as an established collecting practice in other fields, as a large-scale assessment technique for entire school systems, and as a teacher's means of instruction and evaluation. The third portrays four very different portfolio keepers: a superintendent, a college senior, and two second grade boys.
Portfolio Portraits invites readers to join the twelve contributors and the writers they portray, to experiment with them as they work with portfolios. Keeping a portfolio is a long and disciplined process, but for those teachers and students who are willing to make decisions for themselves, portfolios can be intimate records of personal literacy histories. The reward is worth the struggle as portfolios not only catalogue successes and instructive failures but become inextricably tied to the very definition of literacy.
To learn more about Donald Graves, visit www.donaldgraves.org.
Review
This rich collection of excellent articles takes us into classrooms where the value of portfolios is strikingly apparent.Voices from the Middle
Synopsis
Portfolio Portraits offers unique "portraits" of portfolio keepers-from first graders to university sophomores and graduate students, from teachers in graduate classes to administrators in public schools.
Synopsis
s to university sophomores and graduate students, from teachers in graduate classes to administrators in public schools.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. 187-195) and index.
About the Author
Donald H. Graves was involved in writing research for decades. His books Writing: Teachers & Children at Work (Heinemann, 1983) and A Fresh Look at Writing (Heinemann, 1994) are bestsellers throughout the English-speaking world and have revolutionized the way writing is taught in schools. Don was a teacher, school principal, and language supervisor, education director, and a director of language in bilingual, ESL, and special programs. He has also been a codirector of an undergraduate urban teacher preparation program and a professor of an early childhood program. He was Professor Emeritus at the University of New Hampshire. Donald H. Graves 9.11.1930 - 9.28.2010 Heinemann is deeply saddened by the news that Donald Graves has passed away. We, and the entire field, have lost a giant and one of our greatest friends. Our thoughts and prayers are with his widow, Betty, their family, and the many friends he made in his long career. We are honored to have been Don's publishing partner for more than three decades and over more than a dozen books-to have watched his research and vision become not only a classroom reality but the core of our publishing philosophy. His influence is so vast that we will meet him again and again on the pages of every book and resource we publish. His spirit pervades each of our books-in the conviction that children want to write and read if given the chance; in the flourishing of the workshop model of instruction that he pioneered; and in his abiding faith in teachers' ability to make sound instructional decisions. Don touched so many teachers' lives with his smile, his unflagging encouragement, and his generosity of spirit. We hope you will take a brief moment to remember how he touched your life. Watch a recent interview with Don » Remembering how Don touched your life » The Donald Graves memorial fund » Eight Children Teach Donald Graves Nine pencils break the surface of awareness, jutting into the air, slanted back like yellow, orange-tipped shark fins, entering chartless white, exploring hazy depths. Nine voices search a scent, suddenly lurch, lose the line, pause, pick it up again, and move from cloudy, roiling waters of new thought through warm currents of reception, straits of questioning, and tidal imbalances on to a clear, precise sea of meaning. - Tom Romano (Language Arts, 62,2 (Feb.) 1985: 142Bonnie Sunstein is professor of English and education at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa where she serves as Director of Undergraduate Writing in English and Program Chair in English Education. She teaches courses in research, non-fiction writing, American folklore, and English education. She has over thirty years of teaching secondary and college English in New England, where she continues to teach in the summers, at the University of New Hampshire and Northeastern University's Martha's Vineyard Institute on Writing and Teaching. A practical and engaging consultant, keynote speaker, and workshop leader, Bonnie works frequently with departments of education, universities, local school systems, and conferences of teachers. Her workshops on writing, literacy, portfolios, teacher-research, and cultural studies offer hands-on experience. Bonnie's books for Heinemann include What Works, Composing a Culture, Portfolio Portraits, The Portfolio Standard, and she has contributed many chapters in other collections about writing and research. Her articles, poems, and chapters appear regularly in professional journals and collections. She is co-author of three editions of FieldWorking: Reading and Writing Research (Bedford St.Martins). Bonnie has received Iowa's Collegiate Teaching Award and the English Department's John Gerber Award for excellence in teaching, as well as a Woodrow Wilson Foundation "Imagining America" grant for her FieldWorking Online project. She has led two national portfolio projects, served on NCTE's CEE executive committee, Standing Committee on Research, and was a Trustee of the Research Foundation.
Table of Contents
Introduction, Bonnie S. Sunstein
Portfolios: Keep a Good Idea Growing, D. H. Graves
Classroom Practice
Portfolios in First