ePortfolio Hub from Ireland

I just received notice today about a new website in Ireland, which is part of a national program in ePortfolio development in that country.  According to their announcement:

As part of a National-Forum funded project, Dublin Institute of Technology, Institute of Technology Tallaght, Institute of Technology Blanchardstown and Hibernia College are delighted to launch the ePortfolio Hub website, which offers a one-stop-shop for anyone interested in incorporating ePortfolios into their teaching or creating their own ePortfolio, including how-tos, templates, guides, presentations, videos and research findings. 

I participated in a conference last March in Dublin, and I recognize a lot of ideas from my keynote address, which I organized around these three questions:

 

The website contains a lot of videos and resources to either create a personal portfolio, or incorporate an ePortfolio into an academic program. 

The largest section of the website focuses on the How of creating ePortfolios, focusing on four steps (for individuals) or three steps (for programs):

 

The Plan section has great resources that provide checklists and resources that are similar to the Planning resource that I have incorporated into my online course. The Reflect section has an insightful video on Reflective Writing, and a very interesting page on Reflective Practice using Barbara Bassot’s ‘Metaphorical Mirrors’. The Present section includes videos on developing digital identity. The Assess section (for programs) includes a variety of sample rubrics for evaluating ePortfolios. There are also sample portfolios, samples of reflective writing, description of the variety of online tools available, and video tutorials for developing an ePortfolio using WordPress.

Overall, this is a great resource for higher education, with a lot of local videos from students and faculty to support the elements of ePortfolio development. I am impressed and proud to have been a small part of the process, beginning with the conference last March.

Resources on Reflection

I recently found the following resources on reflection in the learning process:

• Where is reflection in the learning process? - an excellent blog post by my friend, Jackie Gerstein
• Empowering Students Through Reflection and Feedback - part of a very comprehensive wiki on student engagement developed by Leslie Grahn, World Language Resource Teacher, Howard County Public Schools. I especially like:
• Reflective Thinking from the Hawai'i Institute of Geophysics and Planetology, School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa
• The Reflective Student from ETE, Classroom of the Future, Wheeling Jesuit University
• Creating a Culture of Student Reflection: Self-Assessment Yields Positive Results from Edutopia
• Getting into the Habit of Reflection by Arthur L. Costa and Bena Kallick in Ed Leadership, April 2000
• Peer and Self Assessment from The National Capital Language Resource Center (includes discussion of the elements of self-assessment: Goal setting, Guided practice with assessment tools, Portfolios)
• Student Engagement and Student Self-assessment: The REAL Framework
  by Geoff Munns and Helen Woodward, University of Western Sydney (includes excellent guides for reflection)
• A Taxonomy of Reflection: Critical Thinking For Students, Teachers, and Principals by Peter Pappas (based on Bloom's Taxonomy, revised)
• How to Foster Student Feedback (from Edutopia)
• Feedback That Fits by Susan M. Brookhart in Ed Leadership, December 2007/January 2008
• Feed Up, Back, Forward by Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey in Ed Leadership, November 2009

There are other great resources on this wiki, worth a few hours of exploration.

mPortfolios Workshop

Iste mobile2011

View more presentations from Helen Barrett

These are the slides from my workshop on Saturday at the ISTE conference in Philadelphia. I am finding that mobile devices are ubiquitous at this conference!

Evolution of Electronic Portfolios

I was recently asked for information on the evolution of electronic  portfolios. My response:
There are several levels that could be addressed: the context, the technology and the pedagogy. In the 90s, much of the development and implementation of e-portfolios was in K-12 schools. That stopped in 2001 (thanks to NCLB?), and the emphasis was in higher education. I am hoping to bring e-portfolios back to K-12 through an online community of practice. In Europe, there is an emphasis on health care, workplace and community portfolios, documented at EIFEL's conferences since 2003. With the emergence of social networking, which one could argue involves portfolio-like activities, the electronic portfolio has become more personal and universal.

The technology began on desktop computers in the early 90s, published on CD-Recordable discs in the late 90s, on the Web with customized systems (or web authoring tools) in early 2000s, Web 2.0 in the late 2000s, and now mobile devices combined with Web 2.0.

The pedagogy began as formative assessment in the 90s, summative assessment in higher ed in the 2000s, and individual learning/digital identity development in 2010s (at least that is what I am focusing on). The current wisdom (thanks to Julie Hughes) is for e-portfolios to be more of a conversation than a presentation.

The evolution depends on which lens you are using to view electronic portfolios. Anyone write up a more formal history of this evolution?

NZ Guidelines for beginners

The Ministry of Education in New Zealand has just published its second edition of Digital Portfolios: Guidelines for beginners (PDF). This publication provides a basic overview of ePortfolios specifically for K-12 schools. In the first section of the publication, there are descriptions of the history, distinguishing features and advantages, and definitions/descriptions of a digital portfolio. It also outlines the possible contents of a portfolio, benefits and outcomes of an ePortfolio approach (with a specific discussion of reflection & blogging); Planning for success, Objectives, pedagogy, ownership & audience, important criteria; and Tools – what’s out there? The last section of the publication has responses to a questionnaire provided by 11 schools. For those K-12 schools interested in getting started with ePortfolios, this is a good resource.

Electronic Portfolios in STEM

In preparation for my participation in the STEMTech Conference next week in Orlando, I prepared a two-page definition of e-portfolios for use in round table discussions. It may be too late to make any changes, but I would love some feedback.
Eport Definition


Here are the source documents referenced in this definition document:

• Balancing the Two Faces of ePortfolios
  http://eft.educom.pt/index.php/eft/article/viewFile/161/102 
• Online Personal Learning Environments: Structuring Electronic Portfolios for Lifelong and Life Wide Learning
  http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dd76m5s2_39fsmjdk 
• Managing Oneself by Peter Drucker
  http://www.public.navy.mil/usff/Documents/managing_oneself.pdf 
• Effective Practice with e-Portfolios from JISC
  http://www.jisc.ac.uk/effectivepracticeeportfolios 
• National Educational Technology Plan
  http://www.ed.gov/sites/default/files/NETP-2010-final-report.pdf

Blogging on Paper

I found the following blog entry:
Learning to Blog Using Paper - a 7th Grade Teacher's clever introduction to blogging (starting with a paper exercise) and using "sticky notes" as comments. Here are the instructions for students (provided in Scribd):
- Seventh Grade Blogging Rules
- The Art and Aspirations of a Commenter

These are great guidelines for reflection and feedback by adolescents. It also looks like a great PD activity for teachers who are not familiar with blogging. 

Microsoft Resource on Digital Storytelling

When I was at the Hawaii International Conference on Education, I heard Bernard Robin present on Digital Storytelling, and he mentioned that Microsoft was releasing a Digital Storytelling resource guide for teachers, using the new Windows Lime MovieMaker (for Windows 7) and PhotoStory for Windows XP. Looks like some nice work and good resources.

Google Sites on Reflection and Assessment

I am developing two more Google Sites with resources to support different processes in ePortfolio development. Earlier I announced a Google Site on ePortfolio Surveys, since I have been receiving requests for surveys that can be used in ePortfolio implementation studies.

The two new sites that I am developing are:

• Reflection for Learing (in collaboration with Jonathon Richter of the Center for Advanced Technology in Education, University of Oregon)
• Assessment for Learning

I have chosen to develop these pages in Google Sites, so that I could invite other educators to assist with the development of these resources. Educators may contact me to be added as a collaborator on any of these sites.

Lesson Plans for Digital Storytelling

I am pulling together a series of weblinks to support Digital Storytelling efforts in K-12 schools: http://delicious.com/eportfolios/lesson_plans+digitalstorytelling

One of the best sites I found is called Sharing Culture with Digital Stories on the Scholastic site, sponsored by Target.

I would modify these lessons to use Audacity to edit the audio track... and to remove references to capturing music from CDs... but otherwise this is a great place to start if you are using MovieMaker2 (their lessons appear to use the Windows Vista version).

What is Web 2.0? (online course)

I received a message today that asked about my online course (http://electronicportfolios.org/web2/class/index.html):

I am in my 40’s, and I never was too accomplished with the computer but can get by at work and home. However, I’ve noticed I am becoming increasingly ignorant on all these new apps (twitter, skype, linkedin, facebook, myspace, etc…) at a much faster pace than before. I feel this would help my career to be up on these new technologies as well...

PS. I know I’m a relatively private person, and maybe it’s my age but I don’t get this pre-occupation with young people putting their lives (pictures, video, personal business) out there for everyone to read? And who has the time to read it anyway!

So, I decided to set up a Google Group to support anyone who wants to follow my course content to learn more about Web 2.0, and to share the discussion with anyone else who joins the group. As an extra, the course also covers how to create an electronic portfolio using one of the many Web 2.0 tools.

* Group name: What is Web 2.0?
* Group home page: http://groups.google.com/group/what-is-web-2-0
* Group email address what-is-web-2-0@googlegroups.com

The course is self-paced and currently available for free (but without any structured interaction). I just set up this class discussion group, and I haven't really advertised the course except in this blog and in the Google Groups Directory. Participants may go through the weblinks, view the videos and follow some the activities. I am currently working on a book, that I call "Your Digital Self" that covers a lot of these tools and social software strategies. I am making this course accessible under an "open courseware" model and as part of the research for my book. I may offer a more formal course next fall... but that is still not confirmed.

I am inviting participants to have their friends to join them in this learning adventure! From theories in education, we know there is power in social learning! That's what these social networks are currently demonstrating with the younger generation. My answer to her second question:

I have some of your same concerns about privacy... I have accounts on most of the social networks, but I don't use them as much as my daughter. I asked her your question (who reads it?) and her answer... "my friends!" The problem is, in our generation, most of our friends are not using these tools, so it doesn't seem to work as well for us as it does for young people who adopted these tools in high school or college.

My Award

I received a PDF copy of my 2007 Lifetime Achievement Award from Eifel. I deeply appreciate this honor, especially at this time in my life. Eifel is establishing a new website, www.eportfolios.eu, an early work in progress which they hope will trigger further reflection on ePortfolios and digital identity. As the only organization that is addressing the widespread uses of ePortfolios across the lifespan and all sectors of society, it will be important to support their development and dissemination efforts.