Tag: ePortfolio

I made it to week 5 in my class EDLD 5303 Applying Education Technology: ePortfolio! I had my doubts as to whether or not I believed that I could do it, but I persevered and made it! Reflecting back to the first couple of weeks, I struggled with creating this site. I am one of those people that once they start on something, I need to finish it. I finally came to the realization that this project will take shape as we go through our other classes. I will be able to change things up as I go along to fit the narrative that I need. Also, I had a hard time publishing my site. Not because I did not know how to do it, but because I was afraid to put myself out on the web. I am not the type of person that likes to talk about myself or likes to be in the spotlight. I was scared that someone would find it and start critiquing it and put it down. Then when I talked to my group, they brought to my attention the realization that we were posting our sites on the world wide web and the chances of someone finding it and bashing it, for a lack of a better word, was slim to none and honestly once I published my site, I felt a huge burden lifted off of my shoulders. I also found myself actually enjoying working with my site.

I will be honest; I had not bought in fully to COVA in the first couple of weeks. I was struggling with how to do everything and was thinking that I had made the wrong decision. As I moved through the course, and watched the videos and the read the required articles it all started to make sense to me. My ePortfolio started to evolve into what it was meant to be, a true reflection of my learning. I can see how this would be beneficial to my students and how by choosing the right platform, they will be able to keep their ePortfolio even after graduation.

Students want choice in their assignments and how to do them. They want ownership in their work. Just passing out a worksheet and having them answer questions, does not give them this opportunity. Students want their voices to be heard and they want authenticity in their learning. Students are wanting to demonstrate their creativity and use this in their learning. I saw this within the projects I gave them during the fifth six weeks. They were able to choose the picture they wanted to draw and they were able to draw it however they wanted to in the program and the majority of them thanked me for letting them have a choice. They told me it was much better than just being told what they had to do.

Now that I have and will be going through these technology classes for my master degree, I am leaning towards having my students create an ePortfolio themselves to track their learning. I believe that this will be a major asset for them for after graduation.