Focused Portfolios: A Complete Assessment for the Young Child

By Gaye Gronlund

Focused Portfolios offers an innovative method to accurately document children's growth and development by observing them in the midst of their everyday activities. Used for years in programs across the country, this easy-to-use system has recently been updated to reflect current best practices in observation and assessment using portfolios, include information on apps and other digital tools to create portfolios for individual assessment and parent engagement, and incorporates individual state standards to develop portfolios that reflect the child's performance.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Redleaf Press
• Release date: Dec 3, 2019
• ISBN: 9781605546759

Book preview

Introduction

Teachers and administrators of early childhood programs in the United States and Canada have told us that comprehensive assessment tools are essential to enhancing the quality of their services. Accreditation requirements, as well as new emphasis on accountability, have created a need for improved methods to document children’s growth and development. These professionals want an authentic assessment approach—something that is not artificially imposed on children.

We have heard time and again that teachers are attracted to the idea of portfolios but worry about what stuff they should collect and how much time it will take to do so. Most point out that meeting children’s needs is their goal and requires their full-time attention. These teachers worry that documenting their regular observations will be an obstacle to being fully involved with the children.

Those who are already trying to compile portfolios are experiencing what they characterize as the stresses of downloading and organizing photos, work samples, and anecdotes. Teachers worry that they are interrupting children so they can document what the children are doing.

We were convinced that we could develop a simple and efficient process of portfolio collection based on authentically documenting the daily experiences of children in their away-from-home settings.

We understood that teachers were already observing children but not always writing down what they saw and heard. We believed they really wanted a straightforward tool to help them focus and record their observations and connect them to accepted developmental expectations for children. Our response was to design the Focused Portfolios process.

Since the publication of the first edition in 2001, thousands of early childhood professionals have made use of various aspects of the Focused Portfolios assessment process. Over time, these educators found ways to make the process work successfully for them. They have adapted the forms and formats to address state early learning standards and guidelines and to coordinate with their observational assessment tools. They have learned the powerful communication possibilities when sharing portfolios with families and appreciate the family-friendly orientation of the Focused Portfolios approach.

The Second Edition of This Book

As with the first edition, the second edition of this book is intended for early childhood educators of infants, toddlers, and preschoolers in child care centers, Head Start and state pre-K programs, nursery schools, and family child care homes. Our goal is to make it simple, straightforward, and teacher friendly. We identify steps in the process of portfolio planning, collection, selection, and conferencing with families. We share helpful hints and strategies to make the process informative and efficient yet easy to implement. We want to help teachers get organized so they can systematically record observations, collect samples of children’s work, and take photographs. The portfolio tells a complete story about each child’s experience in an early childhood setting.

We conceived the Focused Portfolios process in the belief that by designing a structured and planned approach to documenting children’s growth and development, we could accomplish the following:

•  provide an efficient, teacher- and family-friendly, easy-to-manage portfolio process

•  influence teachers to focus on developmental milestones when observing, documenting, and planning curriculum

•  provide an informative developmental keepsake for families

•  assist teachers in planning individualized curriculum

•  encourage teachers to use a mechanism that could account for and explain what they plan and do with and for young children Throughout the book we refer to groups, programs, and classrooms. We use the term teachers to mean any adult who cares for and educates young children. We know that there are many other titles, such as caregivers, educators, child care workers, lead teachers, head teachers, assistant teachers, and family child care providers. We use the term teacher throughout because all adults who work with young children are teachers in some sense.

What Is the Focused Portfolios Process?

The Focused Portfolios process asks teachers to authentically assess children by carefully observing them in everyday interactions in the classroom. This observation happens in the natural context of teaching and providing care. When diapering an infant, snuggling with a toddler, assisting a young preschooler with a puzzle, or reading a story with a four-year-old, teachers are learning about each child’s development. This book shows teachers how to put together a simple but comprehensive portfolio to capture that learning, to document observations, and to relate the child’s development to recognized milestones.

All the necessary forms for portfolio collection are included in this book in a photocopy-ready format. In addition, these forms are also available as editable PDFs at www.redleafpress.org/focusedportfolios. These forms are the basis for reporting to families and reflecting on curriculum. Used in combination with photographs, work samples, and anecdotes, the portfolio forms make up a completed Focused Portfolios set.

The Focused Portfolios assessment process is unique in the following ways:

•  We have designed easy-to-use formats for putting together a portfolio, complete with forms and fill-in-the-blank sheets that can be photocopied for hand-written documentation or downloaded for electronic recording. In addition, the formats can be tailored to individual children.

•  The same forms can be correlated to identified goals for young children with special needs (Individual Family Service Plans—IFSPs, and Individual Education Plans—IEPs).

•  As in the first edition, this book includes two sample Focused Portfolios collections as well as numerous other examples. By looking through these, teachers don’t have to guess or figure out what we are inviting them to do. We explain it and we show how to accomplish it.

•  We offer tips to help organize photos and children’s work. We make suggestions to keep the work manageable, meaningful, and enjoyable.

•  This book includes simple and straightforward instructions for starting to use the Focused Portfolios approach. Teachers have told us that the single biggest obstacle to using an assessment tool is feeling overwhelmed by too much, too soon. For that reason, we have carefully presented the steps for using the Focused Portfolios process in a way that allows teachers to become very comfortable with the basic format.

It is our firm belief that with early success comes the willingness to continue. Once the basics are comfortably under a teacher’s belt, the scope can be broadened, and more depth can be introduced. For this reason, some of the chapters have basic information for getting started as well as ideas for experienced users. With the new suggestions and examples supplied, teachers can further augment their skills and continue to enhance classroom planning and the quality of interactions with children and their respective families.

Why Use the Focused Portfolios Approach?

From our own classroom experiences, and from the reports of the many teachers with whom we have worked, we believe observing and documenting children’s development in a structured way can make teachers’ and administrators’ jobs easier. Since the publication of the first edition in 2001, early childhood programs have embraced observational assessment and recognized the importance of tying observations to accepted developmental expectations. Many research-based assessment tools are available for programs to purchase and are widely used. In addition, various states have added assessment procedures to accompany the implementation of their early learning standards and guidelines.

Classrooms run more smoothly when children’s needs are met. This portfolio process will become a guide to help teachers write daily plans and individualize programs to meet each child’s needs.

Observing helps teachers know children better. By closely watching everything children do in the classroom, teachers can clearly see development in action. This deeper understanding helps meet children’s needs and makes the task of working in early childhood programs more satisfying and interesting.

Providing photographs along with descriptions of everyday classroom activities helps families gain understanding of their children’s experiences while away from home. These concrete illustrations generate focused discussions between family members and teachers and facilitate shared goal setting for the child. Teachers and administrators report deeper connections to families as a result of this partnering and more support for the program.

Sharing the documentation in the portfolios also says a lot about an early childhood professional. By documenting the child’s experience in the program, the teacher demonstrates her willingness to share what happens in her classroom. That raises accountability and provides a learning opportunity for all who contribute to and see the end of the Focused Portfolios process. It says that the teacher is open to having others witness her particular interpretation of developmentally appropriate early childhood education. Documentation invites authentic conversations about what each child has experienced and achieved in the classroom and what next steps make sense for each child.

Directors of early childhood programs may find that the Focused Portfolios process can serve as a vehicle for helping develop a fit between the program’s values and mission and how teachers view what is important for young children.

When the Focused Portfolios approach to assessment is clearly defined and described as part of the program’s expectations for staff, the teachers feel more confident about their jobs. This may contribute to greater teacher retention.

When there is staff turnover, having a concrete format of documentation in place can minimize the disruptive effects. New teachers will have information about the children in their classroom, as well as about the curriculum.

The documentation in each portfolio will help new staff identify a place to start and a direction to go in their work with the children. They’ll have a jumpstart on what each child can do, is interested in, and is working toward achieving.

When new teachers are introduced to children through the Focused Portfolios process, transition and orientation time is reduced and the new teacher is able to more quickly establish an individual relationship with each child.

About the Authors

Each of us has worn many hats in our early childhood education careers: preschool teachers in a variety of settings (including Head Start, college laboratory schools, cooperative nursery schools, child care centers, and special education classrooms), college instructors, and staff development consultants to early childhood programs around North America. As classroom teachers, we were both attracted to authentic performance assessment as the most child-friendly way to learn about and document children’s development. We practiced observation and note-taking and tried out various portfolio formats.

As college instructors and consultants, we have helped thousands of teachers implement these important assessment practices. We have come to believe that portfolios based on observations and sound developmental principles can provide a window into the learning that happens in care and education settings. We have learned much from our own classroom experiences, as well as from the teachers with whom we have consulted. We feel certain that if more people are helped to see what good early childhood programs accomplish, the field and all its teachers will be the beneficiaries.

Unfortunately, this second edition does not include additional contributions by Bev Engel, who passed away several years ago. Gaye Gronlund has continued to work with programs across the country and guide them in the implementation of best assessment practices. The strong foundation of the first edition of this book has served to inform her experiences. She has learned much from the many early childhood professionals who have implemented the process and made necessary adaptations as changes occurred in the field of early education and in the technological options now available.

Field Testing

In 1998 and 1999 we were fortunate enough to have fifteen teachers in Peoria, Illinois, and four in Montréal, Québec, field-test the Focused Portfolios process. From their work, two Focused Portfolios collections, plus numerous samples, are included in this book. These teachers’ experiences and suggestions helped us to keep coming back to what was realistic in most early childhood settings. The field testing has also enabled us to give you a firsthand account of how it has worked in many actual classroom settings.

Since January 2000, many more programs in the United States and Canada have been using this portfolio format. The State of New Mexico Office of Child Development has officially adopted the Focused Portfolios assessment tool for all state-funded child care programs. Many child care centers, university lab schools, prekindergarten at-risk programs, bilingual early childhood schools, and special education classrooms are implementing the process. We are in contact with teachers in most of these programs and continually learn from their experiences. We are grateful for their feedback, shared samples, and stories of both successes and challenges. We have included many of their reflections and insights throughout this book.

Chapter 1

The Focused Portfolios Process

A portfolio is one way to document or keep track of a child’s ongoing development. It is more than a checklist, scrapbook, or photo album. By saving samples of a child’s work and writing anecdotes about his interactions, a teacher puts together evidence of a child’s learning and accomplishments.

Portfolios are well accepted as a type of authentic assessment. Authentic assessment means evaluating children’s growth through their daily activities, instead of using something that is not part of their regular routine, such as standardized tests. Teachers choose authentic assessment because they believe that everyday experiences most accurately show what children have learned and the progress they have made.

We have found that many teachers are interested in using portfolios but find the process overwhelming and time-consuming. We designed the