Why you should use an ePortfolio – Viewing from my students’ perspective.
Let me expand on the merits I have captured from reading documents and listening to videos. I have also put into some practice the art of developing an ePortfolio and have started getting a few of my students to create theirs and learn from what I do on mine. Mentorship and support structure is critical to starting. As one of my students mentioned, this is like e-journaling. Well, I said the advantages are more than just writing your experiences, it is about making meaningful connections about your learning and moving to profound understanding of knowledge that can solve real world problems.
- Choice: Freedom of choice removes the regimentation of teachers dumping contents on learners. Their ePortfolio will allow my students choose how they want to learn and showcase their learning. It is personal to them and this meaningful connections will drive engagement in class. This will ensure active participation in the learning process. (Harapnuik, 2023).
- Deeper learning and engagement: My students are able to show their parents, siblings, and colleagues their work. They will spread it to friends from their past schools and engage passionately because they have ownership and depth of connection with their own content. John Dewey in the reading affirmed that “students thrive well in environment where they are allowed to take part in their own learning processes”.
- The ePortfolio helps with lifelong learning for myself and my students. Learning doesn’t end when they finish the program. My students will be encouraged and supported to take charge of their e-Portfolio all through undergraduate education and ensure the knowledge they capture can be used as they grow and learn more. This will help them to have deep, insightful, and meaningful learning through reflection all through their lives.
- The e-portfolio will help amplify the more the voice of introverts’ learners and develop the capacity for deep reflection for the extroverts. And connecting learning to the authentic world is a crucial justification for me to drive this initiative across my school.
Some few backdrops that must be addressed.
The initial phase requires the student to conquer the fear of digital fluency and working on the available digital tools. The time consumed to adapt to and continue to update is a function that students must ensure leads to true learning and not just other activities without true retention of contents.
The burden for ePortfolio is more on the teachers to ensure they demonstrate that they believe in ePortfolio and also use it to showcase all their work. This will motivate the learners to believe in the idea and also embrace it. Issues of protected personal information and for healthcare field – where we have protected health information – there has to be regulated balance on the details of the contents to be shared on an ePortfolio without violating the codes of ethics of one’s organization or clients or patients.
Young learners may get too focused on the showcasing of their work and lose the originality of pursuing learning as the main goal. When their contents start getting attention, they may want to get more impressive contents and not necessarily focus on the learning process for growing their minds.
References
- Barnstable, K. (2010). 41 Benefits of an ePortfolio. Retrieved from https://kbarnstable.wordpress.com/2010/01/08/41-benefits-of-an-eportfolio/
- Harapnuik, D (2023, September). What is an ePortfolio. It’s About Learning. https://www.harapnuik.org/?page_id=5977
- Why use an ePortfolio http://www.harapnuik.org/?page_id=6063