E-Portfolios: The next big thing? Robin Mason

Evidence of E-Portfolio Use Schools North American Universities UK Universities Policy and Plans

Applications Course Programme Institutional Personal development Lifelong learning tool

Implementation Storage Presentations Assessment Personal development Professional accreditation Group portfolio

What can a student do? Create, store and organise content Reuse what is stored in various ways Share with others In short, a personal content management system

Issues for Effective Practice Lack of motivation to keep up to date Resistance to reflecting Mis-use if only for assessment Ownership Lifelong learning?

Platform Issues Interoperability Standards Software convergence Complexity

So what? Educational trends that come and go... Can we afford to ignore trends? Hype versus reality It isn’t really anything new Can’t we just use existing tools in the VLE?

Uses in the OU Assessment and Accreditation e.g. European Languages Passport, Work-based Learning, Assignments Course specific learning activities (often reflective learning activities) Connecting study at programme level e.g. recognising and reflecting on employability skills Personal/Independent learning/ lifelong learning Staff use e.g. appraisal

ePortfolio aids What I’ve done: experiences projects jobs, training … Programme /course Work Life What I can do: skills, ability etc areas expertise knowledge … Programme /course Work Life What I’m doing: projects, thinking courses career… Programme /course Work Life What I want to do: learning goals career plans skills development… Programme /course Work Life My stuff Creating, storing,,organising individual items: examples events ideas Involves filtering, aggregating, jotting.. … Reusing - making connections for different purposes jobs assignments professional bodies Involves selecting, filtering, assembling Sharing in different media options: self tutor group careers adviser tutor community and wider Reflecting: thinking, reviewing, remembering, joining together, identifying progression

H808 – The Elearning Professional A portfolio of evidence of elearning competency Uses e-portfolio for assessment, reflection, multimedia components and evidence of competency in four areas: Technology Communication Research Practice

Writing about moving targets Dangerous! Crest of a wave or a one-hit wonder? Niche futures Reality always different than hype!

Institute of Educational Technology The Open University Walton Hall Milton Keynes MK7 6AA