What is an e-Portfolio?
Portfolios are collections of realia that have been assembled by a person and are retained and curated by them because the objects contained in the collection evidence or attest to claims that a person might make to themselves or to others about their life. Portfolios have been used for a long time in certain creative professions (advertising, architecture, photography, modelling) and came into wide use as an assessment method for many disciplines in schools in the UK with the introduction of the GCSE in 1985. Portfolios are also widely used in the assessment of competency-based national vocational qualifications (NVQs).
With the advent of the Lifelong Learning Record in the UK, e-Portfolios (the term, like e-learning, covers a wide range of practices and digital technologies) are rapidly growing in importance in education and training. Some bold claims are made. The Europortfolio Project sees portfolios as crucial for lifelong learning in a knowledge society (http://www.qwiki.info/projects/Europortfolio/). And, the e-portfolio research and development community (ERADC) at the University of Edinburgh says:
Many view the e-portfolio as the future of learning, a powerful aid for personal development. The e-portfolio can serve as a tool for learning, assessment, career management and knowledge supervision. (http://www.eradc.org/)
As a result:
The implications of developing and maintaining lifelong learning records is being explored through a programme of JISC-funded projects under the MLEs for Lifelong Learning Programme. The projects are being supported by the Centre for Recording Achievement (CRA) and the CETIS Learner Information Profile Special Interest Group (LIP SIG) to develop scenarios around how learners will maintain and use information gathered by institutions and themselves as learners. [Petal emphasis] (Bailey et al, 2004, http://www.alt.ac.uk/altc2004/timetable/abstract.php?abstract_id=153)
It will become evident that the term “e-Portfolio” is contested, however a commonsense starting point has it that an e-portfolio is simply an electronic version of a physical portfolio incorporating digital objects instead of physical objects. They are, according to the PT3 project, “… the new generation of the old 3-ring binder that was full of flat, black-and-white documents” (http://www.pt3.org/stories/eportfolio.html). LaGuardia Community College calls them:
… a self-selected multimedia presentation of student work that offers a rich and textured view of a student's learning and development. The ePortfolio can include text such as research papers and essays, as well as projects that incorporate images, audio, and video. (http://www.eportfolio.lagcc.cuny.edu/)
While the widest use of e-Portfolio tools appears to be in the education of undergraduates in the USA, there are important international developments taking place in basic skills and adult continuing education. See for example the European Certificate in Basic Skills project (EUCEBS, http://www.eucebs.org/) or the Nova Scotia Department of Education, Adult Education Section (http://www.nald.ca/cbln/projects/dsuccess/Cover.htm).
However, most e-Portfolio tools (like most e-learning) continue to model physical portfolio compilation. Copies (duplicates or certified “originals”) of objects are taken and placed in a storage space to which the portfolio owner has reasonably secure, unique access (e.g. in a file box under their bed). Helen Barrett asks, “How is the insertion of technology into the portfolio development process changing the very definition of "portfolio" as it originally appeared in the literature?” (http://electronicportfolios.org/research.html). Today, e-Portfolios are usually compiled on a user’s own computer or on a (secure?) file server.
e-Portfolios are themselves are often reified and discussed as if they were an entity with a commonly accepted definition. In terms of e-Learning Standards they are usually described in terms of Learner Information Profiles, where portfolios are conceived as collections of information about a learner entity. This is a limited view of e-portfolio processes. Both the compilation of an e-portfolio collection and the deployment of components of the e-portfolio collection are manifestations of reflection. For example, ePortfolio.org defines an e-Portfolio as a “method”:
… a web-based method for you to save work and information about your educational career that you can use for class assignments, resumes, help from career and advising offices, and to create Guest Views to show your skills and accomplishments to family, friends, faculty, staff, employers, and others. (http://www.eportfolio.org/eportfoliomanual.pdf) [Petal emphasis]
Further, “Portfolios allow you to describe the work you have chosen, tell why you selected this particular work, and reflect on what you learned from doing the work.”
Or, as Penn State says, e-portfolios:
are personalized, web-based collections that include:
• selected evidence from coursework,
• artefacts from extra-curricular activities, and
• reflective annotations and commentary related to these experiences. (http://portfolio.psu.edu/about/index.shtml)
While most e-portfolio projects see the compilation of an e-portfolio as an essentially individual activity in which an individual learner gathers objects into a repository, the Nova Scotia Department of Education, Adult Education Section recognises that the compilation of a portfolio is an essentially dialogic activity:
For our purposes, a portfolio is a systematic, organized collection of student work, collaboratively developed by student and teacher to assess student growth toward goals clearly defined by student and teacher and outcomes prescribed … (http://www.nald.ca/cbln/projects/dsuccess/dsuccess.pdf)
ePortfolio.org’s presumption is that the source of the electronic realia will be the user’s own computer or possibly the user’s own file store on an educational institution’s server. The process of compiling an e-portfolio collection involves uploading copies of digital objects from the user’s personal file store to the e-Portfolio.org file store. However, with the proliferation of web services and the evolution of personal computing the compilation of an e-portfolio collection now often requires access to objects held in multiple distributed databases with differing authentication and access regimes.
With the advent of the Lifelong Learning Record in the UK, e-Portfolios (the term, like e-learning, covers a wide range of practices and digital technologies) are rapidly growing in importance in education and training. Some bold claims are made. The Europortfolio Project sees portfolios as crucial for lifelong learning in a knowledge society (http://www.qwiki.info/projects/Europortfolio/). And, the e-portfolio research and development community (ERADC) at the University of Edinburgh says:
Many view the e-portfolio as the future of learning, a powerful aid for personal development. The e-portfolio can serve as a tool for learning, assessment, career management and knowledge supervision. (http://www.eradc.org/)
As a result:
The implications of developing and maintaining lifelong learning records is being explored through a programme of JISC-funded projects under the MLEs for Lifelong Learning Programme. The projects are being supported by the Centre for Recording Achievement (CRA) and the CETIS Learner Information Profile Special Interest Group (LIP SIG) to develop scenarios around how learners will maintain and use information gathered by institutions and themselves as learners. [Petal emphasis] (Bailey et al, 2004, http://www.alt.ac.uk/altc2004/timetable/abstract.php?abstract_id=153)
It will become evident that the term “e-Portfolio” is contested, however a commonsense starting point has it that an e-portfolio is simply an electronic version of a physical portfolio incorporating digital objects instead of physical objects. They are, according to the PT3 project, “… the new generation of the old 3-ring binder that was full of flat, black-and-white documents” (http://www.pt3.org/stories/eportfolio.html). LaGuardia Community College calls them:
… a self-selected multimedia presentation of student work that offers a rich and textured view of a student's learning and development. The ePortfolio can include text such as research papers and essays, as well as projects that incorporate images, audio, and video. (http://www.eportfolio.lagcc.cuny.edu/)
While the widest use of e-Portfolio tools appears to be in the education of undergraduates in the USA, there are important international developments taking place in basic skills and adult continuing education. See for example the European Certificate in Basic Skills project (EUCEBS, http://www.eucebs.org/) or the Nova Scotia Department of Education, Adult Education Section (http://www.nald.ca/cbln/projects/dsuccess/Cover.htm).
However, most e-Portfolio tools (like most e-learning) continue to model physical portfolio compilation. Copies (duplicates or certified “originals”) of objects are taken and placed in a storage space to which the portfolio owner has reasonably secure, unique access (e.g. in a file box under their bed). Helen Barrett asks, “How is the insertion of technology into the portfolio development process changing the very definition of "portfolio" as it originally appeared in the literature?” (http://electronicportfolios.org/research.html). Today, e-Portfolios are usually compiled on a user’s own computer or on a (secure?) file server.
e-Portfolios are themselves are often reified and discussed as if they were an entity with a commonly accepted definition. In terms of e-Learning Standards they are usually described in terms of Learner Information Profiles, where portfolios are conceived as collections of information about a learner entity. This is a limited view of e-portfolio processes. Both the compilation of an e-portfolio collection and the deployment of components of the e-portfolio collection are manifestations of reflection. For example, ePortfolio.org defines an e-Portfolio as a “method”:
… a web-based method for you to save work and information about your educational career that you can use for class assignments, resumes, help from career and advising offices, and to create Guest Views to show your skills and accomplishments to family, friends, faculty, staff, employers, and others. (http://www.eportfolio.org/eportfoliomanual.pdf) [Petal emphasis]
Further, “Portfolios allow you to describe the work you have chosen, tell why you selected this particular work, and reflect on what you learned from doing the work.”
Or, as Penn State says, e-portfolios:
are personalized, web-based collections that include:
• selected evidence from coursework,
• artefacts from extra-curricular activities, and
• reflective annotations and commentary related to these experiences. (http://portfolio.psu.edu/about/index.shtml)
While most e-portfolio projects see the compilation of an e-portfolio as an essentially individual activity in which an individual learner gathers objects into a repository, the Nova Scotia Department of Education, Adult Education Section recognises that the compilation of a portfolio is an essentially dialogic activity:
For our purposes, a portfolio is a systematic, organized collection of student work, collaboratively developed by student and teacher to assess student growth toward goals clearly defined by student and teacher and outcomes prescribed … (http://www.nald.ca/cbln/projects/dsuccess/dsuccess.pdf)
ePortfolio.org’s presumption is that the source of the electronic realia will be the user’s own computer or possibly the user’s own file store on an educational institution’s server. The process of compiling an e-portfolio collection involves uploading copies of digital objects from the user’s personal file store to the e-Portfolio.org file store. However, with the proliferation of web services and the evolution of personal computing the compilation of an e-portfolio collection now often requires access to objects held in multiple distributed databases with differing authentication and access regimes.
