Providing Connections
through ePortfolios
Katherine Lithgow
Jane Holbrook
Bob Sproule
Tracy Penny Light
University of Waterloo
MERLOT International Conference
Ottawa 2006
Overview
• Documenting Competencies with
ePortfolios at UW
– UW Model
– Making Connections within Accounting
and Financial Management
– Making Connections in History
– Interdisciplinary Connections
– Facilitating a dialogue among faculty
History
• Focus on developing historical
thinking
– Chris
• Encourage students to make
connections between learning in
history and other learning
experiences
– Sarah
Accounting and Financial
Management
• Professional “soft-skills” - initially
focused on teamwork skills
– Brooke
• Building on academic skills in the
workplace (co-op work terms)
– Thermani
• Residence Learning Community
Making Connections:
Academic to Workplace
“I realized a connection between school
and the workplace when I was forced to
reflect back on assignments and readings
about ethics when trying to make ethical
and appropriate decisions in the workplace.
For example, in every file I prepared this
term, ethics played a large role…I never
comprehended when learning about ethics
in school that they would constantly be on
my mind in the workplace.”
Helping Students Make
Connections between Courses
•
Making use of eportfolios to strengthen
connections between 3 courses in 2 different
faculties:
 Biol 130 - Introductory Cell Biology (Faculty of
Science)
 Biol 273 - Human Physiology (Faculty of
Science)
 Kin 105 - Cardiovascular and Respiratory
Responses to Exercise (Faculty of Applied
Health Sciences)
Kinesiology Students must take all three of these courses in
sequence.
Many Science Pre-med students will take both Biology courses.
Connecting Applied Health Science
Courses with Science Courses
• Instructors observed that students often can
not make the necessary connections
between common core concepts in their
courses
• Example ATP in Biol 130 → Biol 273,
cardio function in Biol 273 → Kin 105
• Eportfolios can help students create, store,
and retrieve what they need to chart their
individual pathway through their courses.
Eportfolios in Biol 130 and Biol 273
• Students are introduced to eportfolios and
how they can be used to document
academic and personal development
through their time at UW
• Eportfolios are used to store key concept
maps and personal course glossaries, and
to respond to associated reflection
questions
• These concept maps will be referred to in
many other Biology and Kin courses too
Reflection Questions: Example
Think about these questions when you place the
glycolysis concept map in your eportfolio.
1.
How is this concept map about glycolysis connected to
other concepts in this course/ subsequent courses?
2.
What misconceptions did you have about glycolysis before
you completed this piece of work? (e.g. often students think
that all the reactions are reversible).
Eportfolios in Kin 105
• Concept maps from Biol 273 are used in class
• Explicit connections are made between
concepts learned in Biol 273 and the Kin 105
laboratory activities relating to the
cardiovascular exercise environment
Evaluating Learning Impact and Student
Response to Eportfolios
•
Surveys of student response/satisfaction with eportfolio use in the
three classes. How are students using them, etc?
Kin students will illustrate a 3 course time sequence
•
Comparisons of class performance on common questions in the
midterms and exams of the W06 and W07 classes of Biol 273 (with
and without eportfolio activities) Are the Biol 130 and Biol 273
eportfolio exercises effective in helping students make appropriate
connections so that they perform better?
•
Comparisons of the performance on small early and late term tests
in Kin 105 in Fall 06 and Fall 07 (with and without eportfolio
activities) to evaluate knowledge on items that would be in the Biol
273 glossary (terminology) and cardiovascular and respiratory
concepts. Are the Biol 273 and Kin 105 eportfolio exercises
effective in helping students retain information?
Eportfolios:
Promoting Dialogue
Among Instructors on
Course/Curriculum Design
6th Annual
Merlot International Conference
Working With and Learning from the World’s Best
August 8-11, 2006
Ottawa Congress Centre
Ottawa Ontario
Katherine Lithgow
University of Waterloo
klithgow@uwaterloo.ca
Eportfolios in Accounting Program
2004
Bob Sproule
AFM 131
Grant Russell
AFM 481
Eportfolios in Accounting Program
2006
Kerry Mahoney
Co-operative
Education and
Career Services
Pam Charbonneau
Residence Life
?
Speech and
Communications
Jill Tomasson Goodwin
Speech Communication:
Advanced
Intercultural Communications
• Learning E-Portfolio: an on-line
representation of student’s learning
processes over the semester
• Students provided a meta-reflection
of the course through the eportfolio
• Presented to the class
Meta Reflections in Eportfolios
• What the students perceived as
valuable learning experiences in the
course was not always what instructor
had identified as the course learning
objectives
Perspective Transformation
• how do students change their perspective
over time- intellectually and affectively
• transformation relies on reflection and
sustained reflection
• eportfolios helped instructor address the
challenge of assessing learning throughout
the course when when entry knowledge and
experience is so different?
Encouraging Dialogue
Drama and Speech Communication
Kate Willink
Diana Denton
Jill Tomasson Goodwin
Bachelor of Accounting and Financial Management
Program
Eportfolios in Biology/Kinesiology
Faculty of Applied
Health Sciences
Faculty of Science
Began with three instructors
Dragana Miskovic
Biol 130
Intro Cell
Biology
Vivian Dayeh
Biol 130
Biol 273
Principles of
Human
Physiology 1
Doug Painter
Kin 105
Cardiovascular &
Respiratory
Response to
Exercise
Now includes discussions
among
• Biology department- 6 courses
• Kinesiology department- 6 courses
• Health Studies and Gerontology
– many of the biol, kin and chem courses are
common to both kin and HSG students
• Librarians- information literacy concepts
• Considered for use in higher level courses to help
students see the application of the concepts in the
community and workplace environment
Eportfolios in the Master of
Public Health Program
• Students document progress on core
competencies and prepare for the
capstone project
• Means to engage instructors
• Web Developers role
Eportfolios Equals Engagement
Eportfolios and Students
1. buy-in
– introduction is important
2. motivation
– what’s in it for me?
3. assessment
– of reflections, provision of evidence of
student learning
4. eportfolio technology
[Tosh, Penny Light, Fleming. Haywood (Fall 2005)
Forthcoming in Canadian Journal of Learning Technology]
Eportfolios and Instructors
1. Instructor buy-in
– introduction is important
2. motivation
– what’s in it for me?
How much extra work will this entail?
3. assessment
– of reflections, provision of evidence of
student learning
4. eportfolio technology