I have just stumbled on Helen Barrett's blog. Helen is one of the most frequent speakers at e-portfolio conferences across the world. She is committed to the notion that an e-portfolio should be a creative reflection of and owned by an individual and as a result would struggle with the sort of e-portfolio we deliver.
There is currently on her blog yet another debate about the purpose of an e-portfolio. I have left the following entry.
Since I have been involved in developing and working with e-portfolios over the past five plus years I have watched these discussions about what is an e-portfolio with waning interest.
There is nobody who would claim that electronic portfolios are just for assessment. However if there is no possibility that the learner can easily use the content within an e-portfoio for assessment, by which I mean that the learner/individual can use the content to demonstrate their skills and knowledge, then you are inevitably faced with question of So What? It was a question that Serge Ravet grampled with in a memorable paper a few years ago.
Furthermore who is to say that assessment limits creativity. I know of many people who use e-portfolios in a highly creative way even when the end 'product' is to do with assessment.
It is time this tired argument, with its tired and unnecessary semantic nuances is put to bed'
A few years ago I presented a seminar at a conference organised by Eif-l the European Institute of e-Learning where both Serge and Helen were speakers. My paper was a joint presentation with the Royal College of Nursing and was called 'Cake for the Masses' and was designed to show that it was quite possible for one e-portfolio system to be developed to meet multiple requirements.
I used the memorable poem by Roger McGough;
'You wanted one thing
I wanted the other
We couldn't have our cake
So we ate each other.'
In the debates about what an e-portfolio is we are in danger of losing sight of the key debate about what it can do to support learning.
Monday 17 May 2010
The Internet is at last transforming learning
I recall the words of the then US Secretary Of Education Rod Paige that just having technology in classrooms was not of itself sufficient.
"It's not enough to have a computer and an Internet connection in the classroom if they are not turned on. It's not even enough to turn them on if they are not integrated into the curriculum, And it's pointless to integrate them into the curriculum if they don't add value to student performance. So our mission should be about the quality of education, not the quantity of computers "
His words were spoken at the turn of the millenium and since that time I have wandered into various classrooms and College campuses and seen little evidence that the way that the curriculum was delivered was starting to change, other than in ICT classes where you have to work very hard not to integrate computers. That is until now.
Recently I visited the new Newcastle under Lyme College building. It is a great learning environment full of space with computers located in the places where students are most likely to be. It was lunchtime and I caught sight of two young students sat at one of the computers on the edge of the cafe area, downloading from their mobile, images of the hair cuts they had completed that morning and cross referencing them against some occupational standards. They were engrossed as were the students in the salon itself who were competing a colourful interactive exercise about of all things Health and Safety.
Last week I attended as I have done for the past thirteen years the summer school music concert. The first concerts we attended usually had more polished performances by ensembles however everything has now changed. They are full of work composed by the students themsleves. Of course composed 'work' was there before however it tended to be the school heavy rock band crashing out a number. Now it was the variety of the music that was presented that was so impressive.
I asked one of the performers about her work. She explained that she had never been taught the guitar but she had found a website on Youtube where there were lots of different videos you could watch designed to help you not only learn the guitar but to compose as well.
The evening finished with the school's dance performance for a local 'Rock Challenge.' A really full on committed and disciplined performance with over 50 dancers involved. We were told that the young people involved had choreographed and organised it themselves and I was pointed towards the 'Rock Challenge' blog. It provides both a great history of how the work was created and it is also real evidence of a live learning community.
What impresses is not the technology but the learning it enables and supports.
"It's not enough to have a computer and an Internet connection in the classroom if they are not turned on. It's not even enough to turn them on if they are not integrated into the curriculum, And it's pointless to integrate them into the curriculum if they don't add value to student performance. So our mission should be about the quality of education, not the quantity of computers "
His words were spoken at the turn of the millenium and since that time I have wandered into various classrooms and College campuses and seen little evidence that the way that the curriculum was delivered was starting to change, other than in ICT classes where you have to work very hard not to integrate computers. That is until now.
Recently I visited the new Newcastle under Lyme College building. It is a great learning environment full of space with computers located in the places where students are most likely to be. It was lunchtime and I caught sight of two young students sat at one of the computers on the edge of the cafe area, downloading from their mobile, images of the hair cuts they had completed that morning and cross referencing them against some occupational standards. They were engrossed as were the students in the salon itself who were competing a colourful interactive exercise about of all things Health and Safety.
Last week I attended as I have done for the past thirteen years the summer school music concert. The first concerts we attended usually had more polished performances by ensembles however everything has now changed. They are full of work composed by the students themsleves. Of course composed 'work' was there before however it tended to be the school heavy rock band crashing out a number. Now it was the variety of the music that was presented that was so impressive.
I asked one of the performers about her work. She explained that she had never been taught the guitar but she had found a website on Youtube where there were lots of different videos you could watch designed to help you not only learn the guitar but to compose as well.
The evening finished with the school's dance performance for a local 'Rock Challenge.' A really full on committed and disciplined performance with over 50 dancers involved. We were told that the young people involved had choreographed and organised it themselves and I was pointed towards the 'Rock Challenge' blog. It provides both a great history of how the work was created and it is also real evidence of a live learning community.
What impresses is not the technology but the learning it enables and supports.
Wednesday 5 May 2010
End of Ning Free Service
I could not have choreographed it better, indeed it could even look to be deliberate, the day after a posted the previous blog I receive a news flash prompted by the decision to end the Ning free service. Ning is simply a customised social network for any group of users, based on underlying technology from ning.com In its basic form, the Ning is free to set and use but lately the use of it has become more sophisticated and I have certainly seen it demonstrated as a way of creating learning environments.
The controversy now is about the fact that suddenly those who have used it in the belief that it was free are now going to be faced with charges. Ning announced yesterday that three versions of the Ning platform-Ning Pro, Ning Plus and Ning Mini will launch in July 2010 and the 'free ad-supported product' will be phased out. The charges appear to be prompted by the recognition that the maintenance and development of code is costly. 'Our shift to a paid service model will enable us to focus to a greater degree on enhancing the features, performance and services we offer to our paying network creators.'
It is also significant that the news flash I received links the end of the Ning free service with 'the new approach to personal data management by Facebook.' Keeping users personal data safe is a growing issue. Recently following the award of a government contract we were first faced with demonstrating that we met the stringent measures now set by government for looking after personal data. In this case these measures were set at the highest level because the data belonged to children under 16. We passed because underlying our NOW.net platform is a highly sophisticated tool that allows us 'to control' what individuals can do and see using groups, roles and permissions. Creating and making available such an environment does cost but the benefits it brings of ensuring that individuals data is genuinely secure are worth it.
The controversy now is about the fact that suddenly those who have used it in the belief that it was free are now going to be faced with charges. Ning announced yesterday that three versions of the Ning platform-Ning Pro, Ning Plus and Ning Mini will launch in July 2010 and the 'free ad-supported product' will be phased out. The charges appear to be prompted by the recognition that the maintenance and development of code is costly. 'Our shift to a paid service model will enable us to focus to a greater degree on enhancing the features, performance and services we offer to our paying network creators.'
It is also significant that the news flash I received links the end of the Ning free service with 'the new approach to personal data management by Facebook.' Keeping users personal data safe is a growing issue. Recently following the award of a government contract we were first faced with demonstrating that we met the stringent measures now set by government for looking after personal data. In this case these measures were set at the highest level because the data belonged to children under 16. We passed because underlying our NOW.net platform is a highly sophisticated tool that allows us 'to control' what individuals can do and see using groups, roles and permissions. Creating and making available such an environment does cost but the benefits it brings of ensuring that individuals data is genuinely secure are worth it.
Sunday 2 May 2010
Open does not mean Free
It is now notable how many times that the Open source 'debate' comes up in discussion as those faced with making decisions about resources grapple with what choice to make about software. Open and free? almost too good to be true so what's the catch?
Well it's not free. The code might be but someone has to work out how to use it. It is just that you swop the dependance on a software house to dependance on the people who develop the code for you. There are lots of companies making good money from deploying and maintaining open source software.
It is a challenge to this company to ensure that all the various pieces of code in our core platform all work effectively work together. No matter how well we test and plan there are sometimes those unseen consequences from implementing one change on other parts of our solutions. Last week it was the new pivot table for reporting impacting on the editor tool we use but only for those using Firefox and Safari.
Fortunately it was a quick fix because we work within a secure and a restricted environment with respect to the code we use. It is difficult to imagine the challenges, where there is the possibility that the code that you have grabbed from a more 'open' environment, you then subsequently discover has changed when you need to make a fix.
It is not surprising that there is a growing trend of organisations who 'purchase' the creation of a solution using open source software are then reluctant to make it available to others.
We support the principles that underlie the Open source movement and our customers frequently share and benefit from changes to our core NOW.net platform that others have requested and funded. However we also recognise that our customers require quaranteed reliability and stability which is why we will continue to be .net and meet that relatively small cost.
Well it's not free. The code might be but someone has to work out how to use it. It is just that you swop the dependance on a software house to dependance on the people who develop the code for you. There are lots of companies making good money from deploying and maintaining open source software.
It is a challenge to this company to ensure that all the various pieces of code in our core platform all work effectively work together. No matter how well we test and plan there are sometimes those unseen consequences from implementing one change on other parts of our solutions. Last week it was the new pivot table for reporting impacting on the editor tool we use but only for those using Firefox and Safari.
Fortunately it was a quick fix because we work within a secure and a restricted environment with respect to the code we use. It is difficult to imagine the challenges, where there is the possibility that the code that you have grabbed from a more 'open' environment, you then subsequently discover has changed when you need to make a fix.
It is not surprising that there is a growing trend of organisations who 'purchase' the creation of a solution using open source software are then reluctant to make it available to others.
We support the principles that underlie the Open source movement and our customers frequently share and benefit from changes to our core NOW.net platform that others have requested and funded. However we also recognise that our customers require quaranteed reliability and stability which is why we will continue to be .net and meet that relatively small cost.
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