Archives - Summer 2007

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E-portfolios in the Business/Computer Classroom

Interviews with Real Teachers: E-Portfolios as a Teaching Tool

E-Portfolios in the Business/Computer Classroom
Tonya Skinner, Oran High School, Oran, MO

As we teach students who are growing up in a computer and video game world, it becomes necessary to find ways to engage them as learners. Many will agree that students who create projects that they actually use (in other classes, at home, etc.) take great ownership of the projects and work hard to make sure the projects are the best they can be. To address this on a larger scale, e-portfolios are growing in popularity.

E-portfolios are electronic portfolios, either consisting of Web-Based materials or materials burned to a CD or DVD, that can be viewed electronically. They can be used by students to showcase their work to parents, peers, colleges, and potential employers. Unlike paper portfolios, which are bulky and difficult to reproduce, e-portfolios give students the opportunity to share their work in a simpler, more technological way. Digital content is easy to distribute and can include interactive content, videos, and color photographs.

There are numerous ways to set up portfolios. Most research shows that developing portfolios to showcase work and writing reflections on the portfolio selection is critical. Reflective writing is a tool that helps students to think about why an item is "good enough" to be in the portfolio and how it demonstrates various concepts or techniques. From an instructional standpoint, it helps teachers to know that the students actually mastered the concepts being assessed.

Fortunately, just about any student can create functional electronic portfolios. Any web design software (FrontPage, Dreamweaver) can be used to create the portfolio. If a school does not have Web design software, free options are available or PowerPoint can even be used. Many free programs are available to help you capture thumbnails, create PDFs, and do any of the small tasks necessary to make a user-friendly, cross-platform product.

The beauty of the portfolio, either paper or electronic format, is that it puts students at the center of their learning. In computer courses, students often just go through the motions. They create something, but if you ask them to delve deeper and explain the concepts used, they cannot do it. Using portfolios helps guide students to a deeper discovery of learning. Without knowing it, they are examining how they think and learn, evaluating how they arrived at Point B from Point A, and how they applied what they learned into a completed project. Best of all, from an instructional standpoint, you can see just what your students are getting out of your class.

Click below to view portfolios from Ms. Skinner's class.
*All projects appear with the permission of the students, all of whom are adults and recent graduates.

• Kayla's Portfolio
• Monica's Portfolio
• Megan's Portfolio
• Homework Ecard (Flash)

Interviews with Real Teachers: E-Portfolios as a Teaching Tool
Robert Lamothe, Technology Coordinator/Teacher, Young Achievers School, Boston Public Schools, Boston, MA

Question: Do you feel that the portfolio approach allows students to have a role in constructing understanding of their learning process?

Robert: One of the key requirements of the portfolio is that ALL work on portfolios must be original work by the student. All graphics must be created by the student, such as link buttons, name banners, and graphic works of art. Also, photos must be taken by the student, except for photos of the student and previous photos of their family, etc., which should be scanned in.

Another requirement is that their portfolio contain all the assignments, projects, from eighth grade and as many from previous years as possible. It’s far too easy to download photos, graphics, and other material from the Internet, which in effect turns it into something other than their portfolio. There is a possibility for exceptions if it is clearly stated and relates in some way to their portfolio, such as listing and showing their favorite authors or a favorite poem, for example.

Question: Do portfolios capitalize on students’ natural tendency to save work?

Robert: The most important element relating to students’ saving their work is that creating a portfolio helps students organize their work into a structure that makes sense both for the student and the teacher. For my students I have established a directory/folder structure that is organized based on their grade level. We also begin the process of saving files in an organized directory structure early in their first-grade year. Each year students create a new directory for that year: i.e., a second-grade folder, third-grade folder, and so on. Because their work is being saved in a network drive that is available from any computer or any school in the system, students can get to their work easily, and work is very seldom lost.

For details go to: http://www.robertlamothe.net/rlamothe/directory_instructions
_ya_win2000.cfm

By the time they get to eighth grade, they have a rich electronic compilation of materials to include in their CD-ROM portfolio. What a terrific multiyear evaluation tool this provides to teachers. In addition students are developing valuable computer skills.

Question: Do you feel parents should be a part of the target audience for large projects and portfolios?

Robert: Whole-class or -school CD-ROM portfolio projects are an avenue to pursue such as creating a classroom CD of stories, poems, reports, etc., or a science, math, or history CD. Sharing these projects with parents and the community is a great way to expand on the use of electronic multimedia. The result of expanding the audience beyond the class and the school will be to add a whole new level of motivation and pride in student work, which will also have an impact on the quality of the work being produced and the effort going into it. Going along with that approach is to include the project on the school Web site.

Question: How do you provide feedback on portfolios midway through the semester?

Robert: At the beginning of the year we emphasize the importance of not just pasting in material from the Internet. One technique for avoiding this is to have students create a two-column structure to their reports, with the left-hand column containing material they got from Web sites (citing the source) for their topic and the right-hand column being the place where students will write their report in their own words.

See Internet Research Techniques – In Your Own Words: http://www.robertlamothe.net/rlamothe/internet_research
_techniques.cfm

Material that will be included in their portfolio includes such things as slide shows, essays, and other reports. To go along with the CD-ROM portfolio requirement that all material be their own, it follows that the content of slide shows, essays, reports, and other work be their own. This can get very difficult to manage when it is so easy to copy and paste material right from the Internet. Having students meet this requirement requires ongoing feedback throughout the year.

Question: Should teachers provide a model for the digital portfolio?

Robert: I have provided an example of my own portfolio as well as examples of portfolios from previous students when we actually begin the process of creating their CD-ROM portfolio, which is an eighth-grade requirement for graduating. This helps stimulate ideas for their own CD-ROM and acts as a guideline for how to begin. I am careful to emphasize that these are only examples to generate ideas for how they will make their own portfolios look and how they will organize them. I have found that students will want to create something that is different and showcases their individuality.

Question: Do you use portfolios mainly as an assessment tool?

Robert: I have used portfolios for many years as my primary assessment tool. I always felt that having actual material to look at is a very effective way to assess students. Electronic portfolios add a great deal to the effectiveness of the portfolio approach because it makes it much easier to look at their development through the grades when you can go onto their network drive and look at previous stories that they wrote or slideshows that they did either in the current year or previous years. Work can also be copied to a shared work drive for any particular assignment.

Another very effective assessment tool related to portfolios is filming students while they are reading, writing, speaking, and so on. One method involves filming the student on MiniDV camcorders while simultaneously recording to a DVD recorder using the FireWire port out of the camcorder feeding directly into the DVD. That DVD can then be easily reviewed later and can be used to discuss student progress and abilities with parents, administrators, IEP teams, or teams for the ISSP (Individual Student Success Plan). In addition, clips can be later captured for use in the eighth-grade CD-ROM portfolio.

Taking that one step further, having students create their own documentary movies relating to virtually any topic in the curriculum is an excellent way to provide a rich and invigorating environment where students show high levels of engagement in reading, writing, thinking, and a wide array of technology skills. These movies can then be added to their portfolio as excellent assessment tools both for the current year and future years.

For more on documentary filmmaking for students, see my slide show on the research project I did: http://www.robertlamothe.net/rlamothe/slideshows/
filmresearch1/index.htm

About the Technology:

The application that I use for creating CD-ROM portfolios is called Mediator Pro by Matchware: http://www.matchware.com/en/default.htm

I highly recommend this application for creating CD-ROM portfolios and multimedia presentations. You can export your project to a Web site or a Flash Web site. Student work can be copied and pasted directly from Microsoft Word or any application and maintain its formatting, fonts, and so on. It handles movies and sound very well.

Related Portfolio Links:

Robert Lamothe teacher Web site:
http://www.robertlamothe.net/rlamothe

Detailed Requirements for the CD-ROM Portfolio:
http://www.robertlamothe.net/rlamothe/
portfolio_assignments.cfm

Rubric for the CD-ROM Portfolio:
http://www.robertlamothe.net/rlamothe/rubric_portfolio.cfm

Step-by-Step Instructions for Creating a CD-ROM Portfolio:
http://www.robertlamothe.net/tech_training/mediator7
pro_instructions.htm

Creating Your Own Banner for Your CD-ROM Portfolio:
http://www.robertlamothe.net/rlamothe/banner_instructions.cfm

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