Wednesday, June 6, 2012

High School Portfolios

What did you have for dinner last night?

Time's up.

Did you remember?   I didn't.
That's why I spent time this week putting together High School Portfolios for my teen students.

My oldest is going to be a junior so I haven't had the college application experience yet.  But, after listening to others, I'm keeping records in case my kids need them for college.

Since I can't remember last night's dinner, it's important that I write things down (and store the information in the computer).

I have a binder for my two oldest.  The binder has tabs for each subject for each grade.  With my oldest, I started in 9th grade, but for my next I'm starting in 8th grade because he may use some or all of his 8th grade as high school work.  Actually, my oldest will probably use some of his 8th grade work as early high school courses too (possibly Algebra 1 and Physical Science).

For each subject put some/all of the following in the binder:
  • description of the class which I can usually get from the curriculum provider's website or the website of the online class
  •  final grades
  •  copies of tests
  •  a list of every grade the student received for that class ( I only do this for some classes)
  • for writing- an example of a writing assignment
  • a list of books used for each class- the literature and history lists are long 
  •  service hours- I require at least 50 hours per year for high school 
  • special awards (ie: Eagle Scout)
 A great website that we use to track service hours is   http://www.presidentialserviceawards.gov/


How do you keep track of your middle school and high school students' work?  

Any veteran homeschoolers have additional suggestions? 







2 comments:

  1. The organized binders are a great idea, along with computer backup. I'm going to start doing this next year when my oldest is in seventh grade, just to get used to it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Patricia,
      I think starting in 7th grade is a great idea. You can start any time of the year by getting the binder ready, then make a copy of the table of contents of books like math or science, or print a copy of the course description. You can usually find a course description on a website.

      I don't do the porfolio each year, but I make "School Accomplishments" each year which serve as a way for me to track/remember what each kid did. Did you see my post about that?

      http://journeying-sue.blogspot.com/2012/05/report-cards.html

      Sue

      Delete