Click here to receive your FREE subscription to Campus Technology
Features
Electronic Student Assessment: The Power of the Portfolio
8/29/2006
20 SMART TIPS AND PRACTICES |
|
| 1 | The ePortfolio technology can be the architecture of the major itself, acting as the mechanism by which curricular objectives are supported and measured. |
|---|---|
| 2 | Collectively, ePortfolios can be mined to get a sense of overall program quality. |
| 3 | ePortfolios have become source material by which to gauge the value of the faculty-student interaction. |
| 4 | ePortfolios can boost students’ ability to integrate learning and to make connections.. |
| 5 | ePortfolios can help administrators/faculty evaluate the institution’s capacity to deliver on curricular promises. |
| 6 | In order for ePortfolio efforts to succeed, schools must document the impact of the technology on students, faculty, and the institution. |
| 7 | Most ePortfolio efforts fall into three main categories: developmental, refflective, and representational. |
| 8 | The three main fflavors of ePortfolio (above) may be mixed to achieve different learning, personal, or work-related outcomes. |
| 9 | At some schools, students can use the ePortfolio system to access personalized academic information and reports on academic history, take placement tests, and check on their placement recommendations. |
| 10 | ePortfolios offer better ways to collaborate on development of standards, criteria, and measurement. |
| 11 | Consider adopting ePortfolios gradually, in a handful of departments. |
| 12 | ePortfolios can allow students to participate in the campus housing lottery and submit evaluations of their resident advisers. |
| 13 | Students can customize their ePortfolios by adding RSS feeds of their interests from the web. |
| 14 | ePortfolios can be programmed to let students interface with the school’s content management system. |
| 15 | Watch unchecked growth in ePortfolios: Adding applications can clutter ePortfolio systems, and organizing the apps after the fact can be challenging. |
| 16 | Some schools integrate ordinary ePortfolio sharing and assessment features with tools for community interaction such as asynchronous discussion. Individuals with common interests in particular areas can ffind each other and build connections across disciplines and groups. |
| 17 | Don’t think only of institutional constituents creating ePortfolios: Each virtual community can have its own portfolio, welcoming newcomers into the fold. |
| 18 | Why not incorporate your students’ learning records as a standalone application your own faculty—and educators at other schools—can download for free and use at their convenience? |
| 19 | Why not use ePortfolios to evaluate student thinking on new ePortfolio-based (or other) curricula or courses your institution has debuted? |
| 20 | Think careers: ePortfolios are effectively used to help students articulate their own values and then relate them to career goals. |
While the culinary project is straightforward in the way it requires students to demonstrate how they meet ACF standards, the Na Wa‘a effort is more subjective and complex. The open source initiative is the subject of a research project the school is conducting as part of the National Coalition on ePortfolio Research, and is predicated on students being able to articulate their own values and then relate them to their academic experiences, career goals, and extracurricular pursuits. Kirkpatrick says that constructing an electronic portfolio also encourages students to explore their family history online, forming what is essentially a living sociology textbook that changes over time.
Kirkpatrick sees long-term benefits for students, and much growth and expansion of the ePortfolio effort itself: “We think this will give students a stronger start and get them better integrated into what’s going to be required of them down the road. Our ePortfolio program will grow dynamically as our student body continues to evolve.”
Matt Villano is senior contributing editor of this publication.
Cite this Site
copy text (above) for proper citation
Recommended Reading
- Emerging Tech Challenges
- Interesting Developments
New projector technologies and features offer improved picture quality, reductions in operation and installation costs, and challenge our ideas about where and how projectors can be used.
- 'N' is for Now!
With final approval of the emerging 802.11n standard tantalizingly close, forward-looking colleges and universities are deploying wireless "n" networks. Here's what you'll need to know for your own "n" initiative.
- Put It Online
- The Argument for Open
Is open source business intelligence software ready for prime time? Our feature contributor offers BI watchers the open source ammunition they've been waiting for.
- CT Briefs
