J.I.Abbot writes in the comments to this post

But to discourage antiseptic approaches to such work, teachers might urge students to compile all sorts of texts and objects in their lives – as a good habit with a lot of applications. Then the officially mandated portfolio will not be such an unnatural and merely “educational” phenomenon.

I like this idea. The portfolio as a body of work of all sorts is essential, especially when texts connect and refer to one another. One item, say a description of a process, links to another, say, the coded rendering of that process.

Portfolio is one way of telling a story. Where was I? How far have I come? How did I get here? What things have I connected?