Enabling Professional Development with E-Portfolios: Creating a Space for the Private and Public Self

Portfolios have been used for assessment in higher education as an alternative to exams and assignments. E-portfolios offer staff a digital technology that can be both a personalised learning space, owned and controlled by the learner, and a presentation tool which can be used for formal assessment purposes. However, this can result in a tension between process and product, where e-portfolios become electronic repositories of resources that simply tick boxes for career progression. The paper reports on a project that investigated the use of e-portfolios by teaching practitioners developing a critical portfolio of evidence for an award-bearing academic development programme. An e-portfolio had been adopted to address criticisms that conventional assessment fails to take account of the context in which teaching practitioners operate. The project aimed to enable teaching practitioners to access and gain familiarity with pedagogically sound e-portfolio opportunities. In addition, it aimed to foster a reflective approach, promote critical thinking focused on learning and teaching and enhance continuing professional development. of facilitating this has grown. A quick review of academic development programmes aimed at enhancing learning and teaching in the UK shows how the use of portfolios has become a familiar method through which academic staff are expected to demonstrate learning. The use of a portfolio tends to be based on a rationale that argues for ‘reflection’ through a narrative that is supported by evidence drawn from practice. The essential attributes of a portfolio are therefore the collection, organization and presentation of evidence that is then critiqued. It has been DOI: 10.4018/ijopcd.2012010103 38 International Journal of Online Pedagogy and Course Design, 2(1), 37-52, January-March 2012 Copyright © 2012, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. argued that portfolios offer an alternative to traditional forms of assessment and that they may address a significant criticism, namely the failure to take account of the context in which practitioners operate (Baume, 2001; Cotterill et al., 2005). The increasing use of e-portfolios is supported by the view that the process makes continuing professional development “a more natural process” (JISC, 2008) that is portable and easy to update. However, there are concerns that policy has “privileged the technology over the pedagogy” (Hughes, 2008, p. 438). As use of technology enhanced learning develops in higher education, so too does the opportunity for e-assessment. In its broadest sense e-assessment involves the use of information and communication technologies for any assessment activity. As Gipps (2005, p. 174) suggests, “if teaching and its associated resources become electronic, then assessment too will need to take that route, to ensure alignment between the modes of teaching and assessment”. However, this ‘constructive alignment’ (Biggs, 1999) and its rationale need to be based on sound pedagogy rather than merely the availability of e-assessment software. There is a danger that without such, the flexibility and full facility offered by electronic resources will remain largely unfulfilled. As Tomei (2011) suggests, before teachers include technologies into their teaching there is a need for them to understand and experience their application. This paper reports on a project that investigated the use of e-portfolios for teaching practitioners who were in the process of developing and assembling a critical portfolio of evidence for an award-bearing programme within a UK research-led higher education institution. The project aimed to enable teaching practitioners to access and gain familiarity with e-portfolio use for learning. The intention was to offer an opportunity for teachers to demonstrate the change in their practice (an assessment of what they have learned) and learn from the process of construction. The aim of the programme was to foster a reflective approach, promote critical thinking focused on learning and teaching, and develop strategies to facilitate assessment of outcomes on a Masters programme that promoted continuing professional development. ASSESSING LEARNING THROUGH PORTFOLIOS IN HIGHER EDUCATION In the UK, stimulated by national policies (Dearing Report, 1997; HEFCE, 2003; Browne Report, 2010), the pressure on academic staff to be able to demonstrate continuing professional development in teaching has grown. Becher (1996) had shown that academic staff recognised a range of development activities, such as courses and networking. However, demonstrating how any new knowledge gained from these engagements has informed practice has always been problematic (Gibbs & Coffey, 2004). The portfolio, already used in a range of other professions to demonstrate the maintenance and development of learning (Stefani, n. d.), has increasingly been turned to in efforts to resolve this difficulty. The rationale for using portfolios for assessment of academic practice has been encouraged by the recent framework of national professional standards that the UK’s Higher Education Academy (HEA, 2006) has developed. For teaching practitioners in the UK, the HEA has been the body that accredits teaching and their focus has increasingly been on methods to demonstrate continuing professional development following the format used by a range of professional accreditation organisations. The motivation to engage in the construction of a portfolio may be complicated by the extent to which the portfolio is seen by the individual to support career progression and promotion. In all institutions, but in particular research-led universities, reflective approaches towards teaching are often overlooked because the perception is that career progression is dependent on research output and less on evidence related to teaching performance. In addition, as many disciplines are unfamiliar with the International Journal of Online Pedagogy and Course Design, 2(1), 37-52, January-March 2012 39 Copyright © 2012, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. concept of a portfolio there are questions over the validity of an approach that requires practitioners to understand and develop a discourse that may be unrecognisable within their own discipline (Challis, 2005). Even in disciplines where portfolios are considered an effective tool for promoting continuing professional development and demonstration of competence, they can sometimes be little more than a cumulative collection of loosely connected experiences. Despite these concerns, it is clear that the use of portfolios as an assessment tool is increasing. It is therefore important to consider how portfolios are utilized in relation to frameworks of formative and summative assessment. Roberts et al. (2002) suggest that in order to optimise reliability they should be carefully introduced to well-prepared learners and should be of uniform content. Cotterill et al. (2005) warn that there may be potential problems if the portfolio serves both formative and summative processes. Reflection is less likely to be open and honest if the learner knows that the work will be assessed, leading to a potential loss of authenticity. However, the production of a portfolio can itself be a formative learning process i.e., it is as much a ‘journey’ as an endpoint for assessment (Cotterill et al., 2005). Research has attempted to demonstrate how these two outcomes can be reconciled, so that the formative elements support the learner towards a summative assessment. According to recent research (Hargreaves, 2005; Dylan, 2006), the duality of “summative/formative” assessment may not represent opposite poles of assessment. As Taras (2005) has also pointed out, formative assessment is summative assessment with feedback that can be used by the learner. In addition, there is a substantial body of research that supports the use of formative assessment as a method to enable learning (Albon, 2003; Wiliam et al., 2004; Nicol & MacFarlane-Dick, 2004; Black, 2005). The use of e-portfolios may facilitate the development of formative assessment in ways that traditional formats of portfolios do not. The opportunities for the learner to make available reflections as they occur and engage in dialogue that can be recorded are readily available through e-portfolios.HH However, as Hughes (2008, p. 437) notes, “e-portfolio is a contested term and set of practices which have often been dominated by discussions about the tools used rather than the transformation in learning and teaching that such a domain and conceptual shift might support”. THE USE OF AN E-PORTFOLIO Lorenzo and Ittleson (2005, p. 1) defined an e-portfolio as “a digitized collection of artifacts including demonstrations, resources, and accomplishments that represent an individual”. However, as our understanding has grown authors have suggested different perspectives. Challis (2005) notes that knowledge about e-portfolio development is drawn from two particular literatures, that describing multimedia enhancements and that more specifically located in general portfolio literature. The focus of these perspectives is different, the former populated by interest in design and tool evaluation and the latter towards processes such as reflection and projection. The literature suggests that an e-portfolio should have as a central theme a personal approach that enables an individual to become more self-aware (Cotterill, 2007). However, it is also noted that e-portfolios are established for different reasons, to show learning, demonstrate particular levels of achievement and to showcase certain talents (Zeichner & Wray, 2001). Smith & Tilemma (2003) suggest two alternative dimensions: those which are mandatory and those created voluntarily. Despite these differences, an e-portfolio is essentially a personalised electronic system for housing material, in this case evidence of learning. It offers staff a digital technology that can be a personalised learning space, owned and controlled by the learner, and a presentation tool for summative assessment purposes at a ‘point in time’ (Stefani et al., 2007). The key functions of any e-portfolio are the collection, organisation and presentation of various pieces 40 International Journal of Online Pedagogy and Course Design, 2(1), 37-52, January-March 2012 Copyright © 2012, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. of evidence and commentaries. According to Cook (2004), an e-portfolio may contain tools that allow an individual (1) to monitor and reflect upon progress against a specific set of learning outcomes, and (2) to enter and store evidence of having achieved those outcomes. These two significant aspects can be facilitated and enhanced by dialogue in which the process is shared with others using tools such as computer mediated communication. An important aspect that has emerged from research has been the notion that the process of establishing an e-portfolio is often as important as the final product (JISC, 2008). There appear several advantages of an electronic portfolio that may find favour within pedagogy: • An e-portfolio can make fuller use of many learning and support materials that are now created, presented and distributed in electronic form (Cook, 2004). It allows greater cross-referencing which enhances usability. • It encourages dialogue and sharing of ideas and development through computer mediated communication and annotation/ commenting tools that can build on faceto-face work in ways that are otherwise unavailable. • In addition, any evidence of competence or learning can remain within the context where it has been established rather than taken out and exhibited as an isolated piece (through a printout), i.e., disassociated from other aspects of the learner’s experience when developing the portfolio. • As it is web-based, an e-portfolio can be accessed from any networked computer, so the user has no need to carry anything. By sharing the portfolio on a named basis, the owner can allow access without needing to photocopy documents – thus saving time and ensuring confidentiality (Cook, 2004). • E-portfolios are portable and therefore can accompany an individual throughout a career, thus more effectively supporting continuing professional development than paperbased iterations. • They offer learning opportunities for both the constructor and the viewer (Brandes &