In 1996 I moved to Maryland where home schools get reviewed each year. Home schools can choose to have the county school system do this review, or they can pay a fee to an "umbrella" (oversight) organization to do the review. A portfolio must be created for each student with work samples from each subject. The state also dictates that (before high school) the school cover each year English, Math, Science, Social Studies, Art, Music, Physical Education and Health. The law actually also says, "or a course plan similar to what similar students study in public school" or something to that effect. So the sad thing is that the public schools don't cover all those subjects every year, but there is no easy way for a homeschooler to find out what the public school students cover. I learned at one point, for instance, that public schools here don't teach Health in like Kindergarten through 4th or 5th Grade, for example. But most home schoolers here don't know that and so they struggle to cover that subject even when teaching Kindergarten.
So homeschoolers are reviewed here once or twice a year. They just put together a portfolio to take to the review that shows samples of the student's work in each subject. If the portfolio review finds the home school to be non-compliant (not doing everything they are supposed to be doing), they get a warning. If they can't show that they have corrected the situation at the next review, they can be required to put their student(s) into a formal school, public or private.
So, anyway, this is about the portfolio, so let me get back to that. I do two things to help me keep organized with my portfolios. First, I bought brown flip top expandable folders to store my year's portfolio in. This one is old and reused, so it has a lot of black sharpie on it, but here's a photo:
Before I go much further, I want to tell you a story about my family and county reviews here. At the beginning we were assigned a fabulous reviewer. Each time we were reviewed she was so impressed with the things we were doing and encouraged us to keep doing what we were doing.
When my oldest reached middle school, we were required to change reviewers to one who was familiar with middle school. Now let me add here that my second had learning disabilities in math and language. She did not read Hop on Pop through on her own until she was ten years old. When we got to this first review with this new reviewer, her reading had taken off. We had a mid-year, and my records showed that my little princess had read sixty library Science books on her own. I was so pleased! She had written a report in Social Studies about Argentina, which was an amazing accomplishment for her. It had been a struggle, but she was fairly on track in her Math curriculum. All of our subjects were done and documented.
The new reviewer looked over my records and saw that my records showed all this reading in Science. Her comment was, "Where's your documentation." I said, "You're looking at my documentation." She said, "No, I mean you have to have tests. How do I know she actually read all these books?" I said, "Because I told you she did. We don't do tests. We talk about what she reads." She said, "Well why didn't you write down questions and have her write answers so you would have documentation?" I said, "We don't do tests! She doesn't test well." She said, "Then next time you should write down the questions that you ask and then write down her answers." Keep in mind this was BEFORE computers.
Next she read the report on Argentina. Now the kids weren't required to be at the review, but I didn't have anyone to watch them so I had taken them with me to the review. So meanwhile daughter #2 had been watching this interaction about the Science reading and, with her mother, had been getting a bit of attitude. So the reviewer read the report on Argentina and then looked at its author, daughter #2, and said, "I see you say in your report that you like Argentina and would like to go there some day..." The reviewer smiled as she leaned toward my daughter. My daughter leaned back and crossed her arms on her chest and said, "Yeah, no, I don't really want to go there. I just said that because I thought my mom would like it."
The reviewer leaned back and said, "Oh! I'm from Argentina!..." I was mortified. After that, we never went back. I told my husband we needed to go under an umbrella organization. She didn't mark me deficient but she implied it and said she wanted documentation next time. In my opinion we had a difference in our understanding of what she could require of me. I felt I was compliant and I did not want (or intend) to make the changes she wanted to require. Our reviews within our various umbrella organizations have never found me non-compliant.
So, back to the portfolio. For grades K through 8 my folders were marked with "English", "Math", "Science", "Social Studies", "Art", "Music", "P.E.", and "Health". There was also always a paper daily lesson planner that was shared between the students. I made sure it was clear on the planner which assignments went with which student. The first four folders were fairly easy to come up with documentation for. For P.E. I often kept one running sheet of paper (think now one document in Word) where I had a line entry for each P.E. activity. A line entry might say, in columns, the date, the activity, and how much time was spent doing it.
For Music I tended to have documentation for my student who took violin and my other student who took flute lessons. For #3 we were using AmblesideOnline.org. There is a music rotation/Composer Study and an Artist Study/art rotation. Sometimes I kept a log sheet, but sometimes I just referred to the daily lesson planner to show what we had done. Similar for Health.
For Art many projects were not flat and would not fit in a folder, so I started taking more photographs. But I did love the way having a portfolio kept us organized. When county fair time came, I could pull out the folder and help my kids select art projects to enter in the county fair!
Now, when I go to reviews, I have my folder system, but I also keep a similar file system on my computer. I take my laptop to the review and am able to open up documents I don't have printouts of and can show photos of artwork done during the year. I have a file called "Homeschool". Within that file I have a file for each student. Within a student file I have a file for each grade. Within each grade I have a file for each subject where I store documents, curricula and/or photos.
So that's how you put together a portfolio for your students. I highly recommend that you do one each year for each student even if your state doesn't require it. It is particularly important when your students reach high school! Colleges want to see samples of your students' work in their own handwriting! Sometimes that might even mean taking a typed composition and writing it out by hand! Just so you know, I didn't experience the colleges that require this. The colleges my son applied to were happy with his typed work samples.
So that's what you need to know. If you have any questions, drop me a comment down below. Thanks for reading!
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