E-Portfolio Implementations and Experiences: Didactical Functionalities of E-Portfolio in Interdisciplinary Contexts

We propose to emphasize the opportunities of using e-learning instruments of teaching/learning in the high school education and to prove, from the perspective both of the teacher and of the formatter who offers courses of continuous education to adults, referring to this theme, the way in which there can be conceived and evaluated some digital curriculum products/e-portfolios, starting from a set of characteristics articulated on a series of criteria, such as relevance, accessibility, availability, attractivity, flexibility, the open/generative character, participation/socialization.. 1 Optimising communication by using new informational technologies trans-disciplinary competence The new changes of today society prove that we witness the phenomenon of mass information on a large scale of professions, a phenomenon which cannot avoid the field of education. The science and the new informing and communication technology (NICT) stand a major role in the present society in the school formal frame, without rethinking the educational system1, through a new paradigm, which should be able to coherently accentuate the three educational dimensions, which are in a necessary interdependence relation: formal, non-formal, informal. Having started from the premises that it is absolutely necessary to form transferable competences and being aware of the fact that there is imposed a rethinking of the teachinglearning strategies, we have reached the conclusion that the didactic approaches projected in an inter subject manner offer a more efficient and more rapid use of methods, procedures and didactic traditional or modern means /e-learning instruments, finding a flexible and balanced way of using them in the same didactic context. A recent study, realised by specialists of the Faculty of Science of Education from the University of Bucharest (The study presented is the first of this kind in Romania of such 1 Manuel M.F. Costa, Science Literacy and Development in the European Union, in Proceedings of the 3 International Conference on Hands-on Science, Costa MF, Dorrio BV (Eds.); 2006 September 4-9; University of Minho; Braga, Portugal, p. 517. 2 Noveanu, Eugen, Potolea, Dan(coord.), Informatizarea sisitemului de invatamant:Programul SEI. Raport de cercetare avaluativ EVAL SEI 2008, Ediura Agata, 2008, Bucuresti, pp.26-29. Conference ICL2008 September 24 -26, 2008 Villach, Austria 2(6) ampleness, having as theme the contribution of technology in modernizing the educational system) illustrates the students‘ interest in the informational technology and in communication, and their attitude towards using the computer in the teaching learning activity is majorly positive. The students want to use the computer and the Internet for classes in different subjects (95.1%). Only 4.2% have manifested a negative attitude towards an increasing use of the computer for learning. The research data emphasise the fact that 74.6% out of the questioned students (representative at the level of Romania which consisted of 5736 subjects – students (3953), teachers (1588) and headmasters (195) – from 199 schools) use often and very often the computer to inform and document themselves and learn in general, whereas 68.8% out of the students use the computer for games or communication. There must be mentioned the fact that, in general, the activity of using the computer for games and communication supposes only information which is outside the school curricula and that documenting in other fields of activity has a positive effect to form the background and to develop useful changeable competences in their professional life. Hereinafter, we propose a solution to revaluate the NITC resources performed in the class in the last years, in order to demonstrate that we are in the stage of going beyond the limits of linear education and that the teacher’s role is that of projecting motivating, collaborative learning experience, valuable for the student and, in this context, to become his tutor, through activities of observation, guidance and facilitation. Thus, the students will be able to revaluate the opportunities of the new educational environement , to form their intellectual and spiritual competences in a consensus with expectation horizon or the society’s expectations. Our project was motivated by the results of a study on 100 students of ages between 11 to 14 and 15 to18 which revealed the fact that, in certain teaching contexts, a student can be inert and not interested and in others he becomes active, creative and motivated to get involved in the teachinglearning process, an idea which should be viewed from the perspective of opportunities to turn to good account multiple intelligence and students’ availability. “To know in order to do” becomes the general objective which coherently articulates our project, structured on two main components.4 The e-learning course Techniques of writing the (non) literary text by means of ICT (http://roinfocds.blogspot.com) (integrated curriculum in the fields of language and communication-ICT) was projected for the classes of philology within the “Vasile Lupu” High School – an institution of vocational education. The course stimulates the students in continuous and efficient process of learning, favouring the development of key competences for life, of using new technologies for communication, organisational competences and cooperation and interpersonal relationships. The contents proposed are approached by new strategies of efficient e-learning such as learning on the basis of resources, collaborating learning, questioning learning, learning through an interdisciplinary project(individually and in groups). The integrated curriculum Techniques of writing the (non) literary text by means of ICT5 wants to emphasize the applicative and interpretative level, the cross subjects competence, referring to optimizing the oral and written communication by using new 3 http//www.elearning.ro/resurse/EvalSEI_raport_2008.pdf 4 Elena Mănucă, Paula Gheorghiu, Alexandru Sevastian, Opportunities and Limitations of the Interdisciplinarity in Possible (Non) (In) Formal Contexts, in Proceedings of the 3 International Conference on Hands-on Science, Costa MF, Dorrio BV (Eds.); 2006 September 4-9; University of Minho; Braga, Portugal, p. 560. (http://www.hsci.info/hsci2006/index.html) 5 A course performed at the philology classes of the last 2 years of high school, for 2006-2008, by prof.drd. Elena Mănucă, trainer Center Educatia 2000+, prof. Sevastian Alexandru and prof. Roxana Gavrilaş Conference ICL2008 September 24 -26, 2008 Villach, Austria 3(6) information technology. The students are given different learning situations where we follow the progress of the abilities to conceive and elaborate, by means of ICT, (non) literary, oral and written texts which satisfy the standards of textuality: cohesion, coherence, intentionality, acceptability, situating, intertextuality. The objectives of the project are: I. Forming the competences of using ICT in the study of the Romanian language through: II. Using the communicative capacities, of netiquette rules, the legislation regarding the copy right and the use of the blog in different real situations. III. Developing the electronic portfolio, (e-portfolio), with its three didactic functionalities (teaching, learning, evaluating) for the students and teachers if the vocational systems in order to apply it to target groups, to ensure a more efficient use of the ICT in the vocational education. The specific competences aimed by the teacher of Romanian are: 1. To recognise and compare different types of structures in scientific, judicialadministrative and literary texts; 2. To adequately understand the meaning of messages communicated in the (written/audio/visual) media; 3. To write scientific, judicial-administrative, publicist and literary texts, by using ICT. The ICT teacher will take into consideration the following specific competences: • To discover Hard and Soft tools necessary in the written/audio/visual media; • To develop abilities of using Hard and Soft tools necessary in the written/audio/visual media; • To be aware of the specificity of the literary language in relation with other arts. The learning contents are organised into two parts: A. Language and communication (Functional Styles of the Language, Publicist Style/the Audio-visual, referring to the journalist genre – news, interview, reportage, Gallup poll, the literary style) B. Informatics – the following contents are aimed: • To access the information under all forms, in different stages: searching, receiving and downloading, processing with Soft tools (text, images, graphics, sound, film, animation), producing information by using Soft tools • To create the information by: Gallup poll, interview, reportage, animation and advertising , literary blog, forum, chat, videoconference. Conference ICL2008 September 24 -26, 2008 Villach, Austria 4(6) 2 Opportunities and limits in evaluating the e-portfolio The diversity of the existing forms of information, its processing and communicating modalities force the teachers to diversify the area of treating the subjects proposed (The reading crisis among teenagers; The influence of written and audio-visual media on teenagers, Correctness and mistake in the written/audio/visual media, The challenges of the (non) fundamental writers, The damaging role of the (in) formative NICT) so that the elaboration and writing of the non-literary text by use of ICT should be a basic component of this course. By applying the evaluation based on multiple choice tests, to check the acquisition of the operational concepts, on written tests of recognising and analysing the stylistic particularities of certain (non)-literary texts , debates, interdisciplinary project (individual and in group)/e-portfolio, the students have been able to prove the abilities and the competences acquired at the high school level. Beyond the inherent advantages/facilities of the WEB 2.0 tools used within this interdisciplinary course, the great challenge of rendering education virtual stands in evaluating the results and the performances of the trainin. We are trying to demonstrate, from the teacher’s perspective, the modality in which the (self) (inter) evaluation of digital curricula products/e-portfolios can be achieved: • Evaluation tests applied either during the course or at the end of a learning unit. • The BLOG instrument cannot require the application of the initial evaluation method, but there is the stage evaluation (the partial one) and the final evaluation – which is compulsory and is done in praesentia. Both of them have been conceived as constructive situations of proper learning. Through the real or virtual teacher – student interactivity, the evaluation proves to be a modality through which the student can become aware of the aspects which require reformulations, content and/or form modifications. The evaluation of a blog/e-portfolio can be realised by using the (self) (inter) evaluation criteria grids. These evaluation instruments will refer to aspects that the e-portfolio emphasises: • Information, reflections, suppositions under the form of texts, images, sound, film, animation and combination of these, all of them reflecting the student’s culture; • Working experiences and abilities by using ICT • Layout of the e-portfolio dictated by the culture, artistic sense, talent and imagination of the student-author; We can evaluate each element, by aiming at the evolution of their use from one stage to another, the student’s level of competence, by relating his products to the objective proposed and to the progress realised during the collection of the products. These methods can be combined. Both the development e-portfolio and the competence e-portfolio prove the level of development of certain abilities. The partial evaluation supposed: • To check the level of acquisition of certain knowledge and to form the working abilities in the ICT are in order to write (non) literary texts, so that the demands of the modern forms of communication and work for a possible journalist should be