ePortfolios and eLearning

At our school we have been using ePortfolios for the past two years, using KnowledgeNet.  Using a template, our students keep track of their own learning, upload their projects and reflect on their goals.  Parents can view their child's progress at any time, and teachers give feedback and feedforward as needed on a regular basis.

Although it was initially a bit of hard work to set it all up, and get teachers trained to use KNet, the kids took to it like a duck to water.  In my class I tend to break down tasks, so that we focus on one task at a time.  I then model the steps to take to the whole class using my Smartboard.  After that I ask for confident volunteers to go and try it out on their ePortfolios.  I can have seven students working straight away, as I have 4 standard computers and 3 laptops in my class.  Those seven students support each other, and working according to a detachable name list, they then call the next seven students, and teach them the process.  The new seven students then teach the next seven, and so on.  As I only have 26 kids in my class, the whole process takes about 45 minutes.  I try to align the tasks with whatever lesson I am taking, in other words, if we are uploading evidence that we have reached our Maths goals, it will take place in Maths time.  I supporse there's no need for this, though - it's just my old fashioned way of keeping track of what's happening in my classroom.

I feel very positive about the use of ePortfolios in our school.  Students are learning to metacognitize about their learning.  They can see how they have reached their goals, and they love to see my comments. 

Jamin Lietse has been researching ePortfolios and provides a link to an MoE document 'ePortfolios - celebrating learning' for those that are interested. You can also get this document, and more, from Ian Fox's download page.

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