eLearning10 (Sydney); Day 1 Wrap

NOTES FROM EPORTFOLIOS AUSTRALIA CONFERENCE Melbourne, 3rd-4th November, 2010

(Image CC licensed by theother66)

Just a month late but here they are. (Spoken summary over at Podding Downunder)

Tom Cochrane

• there are political and socio-political drivers; several revolving around quality
• issues around retention
• recording competencies
• massification??- opposite to individualism, give students a chance to record/document their experience, that they had value, generated a sense of intimacy, relevance, durability – (this makes sense vis a vis the VET sector – not such a sense of massification)

Bret Eynon (LaGuardia Comm College) – High Impact Practices and the Integrative ePortfolio

• cc's in US use epfs less than higher ed, but increasing in all sectors
• the 'field' is growing; there is now a journal

Types

career/credential, learning, assessment- integrative includes all 3 of these aspects

epf can join personal and prof life plus community life
epf also a connecting tool – to other students, and to teaching staff

can be divided into 'working portfolio' where you add reflections and other data, and the public bit that is a final, edited version

(VET: the export from course to epf function is critical so the student does not have to reprocess/rewrite); eg each student involved in Cinderella this morning (E's class) would record something of their experience and use it/retain it for assessment, and beyond

clash with epf best practice with (again and as usual) organisational constraints

'epfs' have always been part of the deal for art and media students

LaGuardia data shows that epf activity has increased engagement and critical thinking, AND IMPROVE PASS RATES

(are the gains sufficient to disregard issues of proprietary tethering, universal tool for all, etc. Should it be mandated and a partic product endorsed???); are there students in Aust VET who don't have sufficient interest in learning? Or is the epf the tool to change that?

“Design backwards” to promote critical reflection
eportfolios are a disruptive technology – it does result in change #eac2010

BEVERLEY OLIVER (Curtin Uni)
Engaging Students for graduate employability

focus is moving towards evidence and outcomes of learning (yuk!)

how did I (we get our jobs??????)
employers don't need to look at epfs to give them value, because this is where you store info that you use in job apps and interviews

what gives you early professional success? (graduate employability)

(CLA = collegiate learning assessment; a new initiative)

Margaret G – Mahara Case Studies

her epf is several sections of her filing cabinet!


1) example 1 – CEMONS SKILLS CENTRE
Hairdressing – used POV; Mahara used with Google apps – Gahoodle!
Finding that spyglasses are too 'mobile' – prefer hand held cameras – thus losing POV perspective
students using epf for reflection
students love using media for evidence **

Streamfolio for storage of vids? http://www.streamfolio.com/

2) ICS Professionals (ICT) – online course run in Moodle

South Western Sydney Institute

using Mahara

learning the skills was a significant issue
also giving feedback in online environment; (presume t's had not done online courses, and were supporting f2f students in an OL environment ) *
again, hairdressing were participants
Gen Y are not necessarily tech savvy (except for Facebook)
all NSW TAFE students have access to Mahara sandpit

Created templates for students to use
epfs involves a PARADIGM SHIFT :)
Com Serv interested but have no time (!)

[If you have a learner who has stuff scattered all over the place do they need to 'join the program' and use the endorsed product?]

Chris Cowper – privacy and epfs

privacy – incompatible with the Net? Outdated? “Scott McNeally (Sun) ” - you have zero privacy anyway – get over it (10 yrs ago)
privacy is about control; you choose your friends (not ur relatives!); when to be alone, when to be intimate, etc

“The Great Risk Shift” - Jacob Hacker http://www.greatriskshift.com/

shift towards the individual
Aust has a plethora of orgs dedicated to privacy and safety of the individual

Privacy Possible?

15 – 18 yr olds just as worried about privacy as older people, but are more likely to disclose personal info than older folks (Zogby Poll) http://www.zogby.com/

intentional leaks by 3rd parties???? a la Wikileaks (Mahara, ELGG – really???)
new concept – Privacy by Design (PBD)
see http://www.trustguide.org/


Victor Callan Keynote

Lumps elearning, e-assessment and epfs in the same title – and asks about challenges??!!
Higher ed a step behind in responding to skills and approaches that industry wants

INNOVATION:

Generation and execution of good ideas - to make a diff, OR produce economic return

• Experimental, disruptive
• Connectedness, collaboration
• We need to be failure tolerant
• Because there WILL be failures!

80% of all innovation that has anything to do with org change fails

How do you make innovation stick?

• Quizzes are most dominant form of e-assessment, YET epfs are what VET practitioners want most!
• Need a plan (strategy), snr leadership support
• Business case
• Etc etc etc – V mentioned several other factors...put them all together abd you have something of an impossible, or at least, Herculean task!

Gordon Joyes (Uni of Nottingham)

JISC epf consultant 2007

JISC epf study director 2007 – 11

If epfs are such a good idea why don’t we see more evidence of them?

· “weak central influence on local pedagody”

· They are disruptive (again)

· Some orgs are using an epf process but not epfs

Barriers to implementation:

A range of processes to be understood

THRESHOLD CONCEPTS like

· Purpose

· Design of learning activities needs to change

· Process

Neither teachers nor students know how to do this!!

Represent troublesome knowledge

· Ownership

· disruptive

Refers to an epf ‘movement’!

Many employers and colleges don’t value epfs

Liz Smith (Engineering – Uni SA)

Assumed that entering students could cope easily with IT requirements:

· 98% have home Net access

· 90% comfortable with PCs

· 93% have Facebook account…BUT…

This did not translate to facility with epfs.

Began with wikis/blogs; graduated to Pebblepad (which had too many features, stds did not adapt well, GUI needs fast connection speed.

Feedback: “too much of a pain . I’d rather use MS Word!”:

Stds did not see the link betw epf, assessment, and life after uni…until

They switched to using a template and they found this much easier

Note: marking epfs takes longer than marking papers!

Test Pic

Test Pic
Originally uploaded by mikecogh

Why I Post to Flickr

“Sharing a photo by making it available online constitutes sharing even if no one ever looks at it.

This “frozen sharing” creates great potential value. Enormous databases of images, text, videos, and so on include many items that have never been looked at or read, but it costs little to keep those things available, and they may be useful to one person, years in the future. That tiny bit of value may seem too small to care about, but with two billion potential providers, and two billion potential users, tiny value times that scale is huge in aggregate. Much creative energy that was previously personal has acquired a shared component, even if only in frozen sharing. “

Clay Shirky, Cognitive Surplus