Never again will I plan an international trip over Skype. Since before November 7, when the proposal was submitted, I have been working with the State Department's English Language Specialist Program to spend several weeks in Vietnam in March, because of the interest of a few English faculty members for training in electronic portfolios. I was told that the proposal was approved in February (but March was too soon to travel). Since then, I have been frustrated because I have not been able to get the details about my travel or the status of my visit. Until April 10, I was assured that they were waiting on final approvals, first from DC, then from a supervisor in Bangkok. A week ago, I applied for my travel Visa. Then, late on the night of April 10 on Skype, I was informed that an administrator in the Consulate has cancelled my trip. Still more approvals needed and paperwork to complete while classes are ending in early May. Oh, the bureaucracy! Now I need to figure out what I'm going to do for the next couple of weeks. Plant a garden? (posted to my Facebook account)
Instead, I spent some time last weekend revising two online course outlines:
The major change I made to both course sites was to provide an alternative to creating an Implementation Plan: creating a Professional Portfolio using the same course lessons:
- Overview (What?) Define the context for developing your portfolio and assess your readiness for developing a professional ePortfolio, including your technology skill level.
- Purpose (Why?) Identify the benefits (and your motivation) for creating your own professional portfolio and write your ePortfolio purpose/audience/vision statement.
- Collection/Archive (How?) Create an online space to store your artifacts and identify the
artifacts you have collected in digital form and how they will be organized in your
portfolio. Identify the primary audience for your showcase portfolio.
- Reflection/Blogs (How?) As part of this course, you have already established your own blog (learning portfolio/reflective journal). You could also develop a reflective digital narrative video to add voice to your portfolio (digital storytelling).
- Presentation/Showcase (How?) Create a hyperlinked website as a showcase portfolio, organized thematically. By now, you should have selected the appropriate presentation portfolio tool. Options are blog pages (WordPress or Blogger), Google Sites, Weebly, Wikispaces, Mahara, etc. Reflect on each category of artifacts plus provide a reflective caption on each artifact.
- Assessment/Feedback (How well?) Write your own self-assessment of your portfolio in your blog. Select
one of the rubrics to guide your self-assessment. Share
your portfolio link and ask for feedback.
Registration for the next cohort of my facilitated Introduction to K-12 ePortfolios course is open now and collaboration begins on May 1. Once a paid member of a facilitated course, participants are not automatically dropped from the course Google Group and may choose to continue learning with subsequent cohorts.
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