From Twitter today: "RT @chamada RT @RobinThailand: The Tweeple have spoken! A WORDLE on ePortfolios created by Twitter submissions. Thanks all. http://twitpic.com/1bv58m"![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=40f633bc-1ccc-429a-a93e-0da6e05ce413)
Electronic Portfolios have been with us for almost two decades, used primarily in education to store documents and reflect on learning, provide feedback for improvement, and showcase achievement for accountability or employment. Social networks have emerged over the last five years, used by individuals and groups to store documents and share experiences, showcase accomplishments, communicate and collaborate with friends and family, and, in some cases, facilitate employment searches. The boundaries between these two processes are gradually blurring. As we consider the potential of lifelong e-portfolios, will they resemble the structured accountability systems that are currently being implemented in many higher education institutions? Or are we beginning to see lifelong interactive portfolios emerging as mash-ups in the Web 2.0 cloud?
Technology also gives students opportunities for taking ownership of their learning. Student-managed electronic learning portfolios can be part of a persistent learning record and help students develop the self-awareness required to set their own learning goals, express their own views of their strengths, weaknesses, and achievements, and take responsibility for them. Educators can use them to gauge students’ development, and they also can be shared with peers, parents, and others who are part of students’ extended network. (p.12)Later in the publication, the following statement appears:
Many schools are using electronic portfolios and other digital records of students’ work as a way to demonstrate what they have learned. Although students’ digital products are often impressive on their face, a portfolio of student work should be linked to an analytic framework if it is to serve assessment purposes. The portfolio reviewer needs to know what competencies the work is intended to demonstrate, what the standard or criteria for competence are in each area, and what aspects of the work provide evidence of meeting those criteria. Definitions of desired outcomes and criteria for levels of accomplishment can be expressed in the form of rubrics. (p.34)Is there some dissonance between these two statements? How will the two approaches (a student-managed learning portfolio and an analytical framework...to serve assessment purposes) co-exist? Or will we need to use two different environments: One that is student-centered, that allows personalization and communication, and another that can be used to hyperlink into student portfolios to "harvest" assessment data, without interfering with the student-centered representation of learning? Please?
Posts
All Comments
