Teacher Portfolios: An Effective Way To Assess Teacher Performance and Enhance Learning
Childhood Education

Researchers have found that while teachers spend significant amounts of time being engaged in assessment-related activities for their students, they do not apply this standard of assessment to their own performance.

The overall goal of assessment is to collect information regarding a targeted program or performance. Specifically, assessment involves the identification, clarification, and application of defensible criteria to ascertain a target object's value, quality, utility, effectiveness, or significance in relation to those criteria (Fetterman, 1994; Shadish, 1994). Through such evaluation, one can examine the appropriateness of the program and teachers' performance in childhood education, providing meaningful information that can improve the quality and application of education programs (Decker & Decker, 2001).

The trend in assessment is shifting from a categorical approach ("sorting") to a more functional approach ("real life") (Wortham, Barbour, & Desjean-Perrotta, 1998). Instead of using traditional assessment, such as standardized tests, questionnaires, or surveys, many teachers choose to use performance-based, authentic assessments to measure the quality of an education program by comprehensively examining individuals' performance (Wortham et al., 1998). Portfolios are performance-based, authentic assessments because they involve collecting information from real-life situations (Bergen, 1993/1994). In the area of education, portfolio assessment focuses on what an individual does (the content), how he/she does it (the strategy), and in what process he/ she does it (the sequence). Portfolios also help teachers to plan for further instruction and develop individually appropriate learning experiences for a specific child (Stone, 1995).

Researchers have found that while teachers spend significant amounts of time being engaged in assessment-related activities for their students, they do not apply this standard of assessment to their own performance (Stiggins, 1991). This article will discuss the procedure and methods of developing portfolio assessment for teachers, with the purpose of helping teachers evaluate their own performance as well as the effectiveness of the program.