Portfolios in the Writing Classroom: An IntroductionEdited by: Kathleen Blake Yancey

A Book Review By: Kelly Kennedy

Dr. Kathleen Blake Yancey Professor of English and Director of the

graduate program in Rhetoric and Composition at Florida State University.

Main research focus: composition studies and writing assessment, especially the use of print and electronic portfolios.

Portfolios in the Writing Classroom A compilation of essays from teachers

and professors who currently use portfolios in their classrooms.

Underlying theoretical foundation of portfolio use is concentration on the writing process as opposed to the final product.

Awesome Things I Learned About Portfolios: Portfolios provide enhancement of performance

through evaluative feedback and reflection. The portfolio process seeks to include and to

validate the writing processes used to create it without neglecting the final product.

Students are able to review their work and comment on the process they used to create it.

With increased autonomy, students are able to discover their own power over their own writing.

Awesomeness Continued Portfolios allow teachers and students to become

partners in the process of learning. Portfolios allow for student self-assessment. Students’ development of ownership over each

piece of writing. The organization of the portfolios not only helps

student find their work, but it also helps them define their work.

Portfolios allow for students to see teachers as collaborators in their learning, as opposed to judges of their weaknesses.

Parts to Whole Each individual essay is important to

understand every option portfolios provide.

As a whole, the collection of essays provides educators interested in using portfolios a distinguished group of various perspectives on the subject.

Significant Ideas Portfolios are a grass-roots phenomenon,

invented by teachers and controlled by teachers!

Two types of portfolios: a working portfolio for works in progress and a completed or final portfolio for evaluation at the end of the semester and for future teachers to use in their assessment of the student’s writing ability.

Recommendation Station I highly recommend this text if anyone is

interested in incorporating portfolios into their curriculum.

Yancey also provides an annotated bibliography and a detailed list of the book’s contributors at the end of the text.

Both lists are helpful when prospective portfolio teachers are trying to conduct more research about portfolios before using them in the classroom for the first time.

Portfolios and Me Currently, I keep a sort of final product

portfolio of each student’s work in my office.

While I may refer back to these to assess student improvement, they do not assist my students at all.

Because English 1301 is highly focused on the writing process, it is the perfect place for the use of working portfolios!

Works Cited Florida State University (FSU). “Kathleen

Blake Yancey.” The English Department at Florida State University. 2009. Web. Google. 10 Apr. 2011.

Yancey, Kathleen Blake. Ed. Portfolios in the Writing Classroom: An Introduction. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English, 1992. Print.