E-Portfolios and the Problem of Learning in the Post-Course Era

1. E-Portfolios and the Problem of Learning in the Post-Course Era Randy Bass, Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship (CNDLS), Georgetown University General Education 3.0 (AAC&U) March 4, 2011

2. “You know. It was taught as a Gen Ed course and I took it as a Gen Ed course.” Georgetown student, end of first year, focus group: reflecting on a particular course in which, he claimed, he was not asked to engage with the material.

3. Core Questions • What are the conditions for the most meaningful learning inside and outside the formal curriculum? • How do we make it possible to see and capture evidence of meaningful learning in new ways? (moving target) • Can we keep the “evidence of learning” agenda open in an age of metrics and accountability?

4. The Post-Course Era

5. The Post-Course Era • The course as a useful way of managing time, staff resources, equivalencies • A collection of courses as way of telling the story of the discipline or profession • Coursework and the formal curriculum as the center of the educational experience—the places where the most significant learning takes place.

6. The Post-Course Era End of the era of the self-contained course as the center of the curriculum “The fragmentation of the curriculum into a collection of independently ‘owned’ courses is itself an impediment to student accomplishment, because the different courses students take, even on the same campus, are not expected to engage or build on one another.” (AAC&U, 2004)

7. Post-Course: Smaller and Bigger the intermediate (capturing intermediate thinking processes) & the integrative (making meaning across courses, experiences and time)

8. Second Wave of the Learning Paradigm (course design & curriculum design) • Active Learning: • Theory/ knowing • Experience / doing • Integrative Learning • Theory/ knowing • Experience/ doing • Reflecting / connecting

9. High Impact Practices (National Survey of Student Engagement--NSSE) • First-year seminars and experiences • Learning communities • Writing intensive courses • Collaborative assignments • Undergraduate research • Global learning/ study abroad • Internships • Capstone courses and projects George Kuh, High Impact Practices: What are they, who has access to them, and why they matter. (AAC&U, 2008)

10. Outcomes associated with High impact Practices • Attend to underlying meaning • Integrate and synthesize • Discern patterns • Apply knowledge in diverse situations • View issues from multiple perspectives • Acquire gains in skills, knowledge, practical competence , personal and social development Experiences that help students… George Kuh, High Impact Practices: What are they, who has access to them, and why they matter. (AAC&U, 2008)

11. High Impact Activities and Outcomes • High Impact Practices: • First-year seminars and experiences • Learning communities • Writing intensive courses • Collaborative assignments • Undergraduate research • Global learning/ study abroad • Internships • Capstone courses and projects • Outcomes associated with High impact practices • Attend to underlying meaning • Integrate and synthesize • Discern patterns • Apply knowledge in diverse situations • View issues from multiple perspectives • Gains in Skills, knowledge, practical competence , personal and social development

12. So, if high impact practices are largely in the extra-curriculum (or co-curriculum), then where are the low-impact practices?

13. Low-impact practices: Formally known as ‘the curriculum’?

14. If the formal curriculum is not where the high impact experiences are then what are the options?

15. Making courses more like high-impact practices courses designed as inquiry-based & participatory Virtual Labs Constructivist social tools: wikis & blogs Leveraging “the crowd” as a way of teaching

16. If the formal curriculum is not where the high impact experiences are then what are the options? • Make courses higher impact • Design for greater fluidity and connection between the formal and experiential curriculum << e-portfolios >>

17. What are the shared and salient features of participatory cultures in Web-based environments? wikipedia Video gaming communities fan sites grass roots organizations Jenkins, et. al., Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture (MacArthur Foundation, 2006)

18. Participatory Culture of the Web • Features of participatory culture • Low barriers to entry • Strong support for sharing one’s contributions • Informal mentorship, experienced to novice • Members feel a sense of connection to each other • Students feel a sense of ownership of what is being created • Strong collective sense that something is at stake Jenkins, et. al., Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture (MacArthur Foundation, 2006)

19. High impact practices Experiential Co-curriculum Informal Learning Participatory culture The Formal Curriculum

20. High impact practices Experiential Co-curriculum Informal Learning Participatory culture The Formal Curriculum Can we continue to operate on the assumption that the formal curriculum is the center of the undergraduate experience?

21. High impact practices Experiential Co-curriculum Informal Learning Participatory culture The Formal Curriculum The Intermediate and the Integrative

22. John Seely Brown: Practice to Content content practice From John Seely Brown, “Minds on Fire: Open Education, the Long Tail, and Learning 2.0”

23. High impact practices Experiential Co-curriculum Informal Learning Participatory culture The Formal Curriculum Where and how does one “learn-to-be,” inside and outside the formal curriculum?

24. Connecting Intermediate Processes to Practice NOVICE MIRACLE EXPERT product product

25. LEARNING processes EXPERT product practice NOVICE processes LEARNING processes Connecting Intermediate Processes to Practice LEARNING processes evidence of process

26. Connecting Intermediate Processes to Practice LEARNING processes NOVICE processes EXPERT practice LEARNING processes Our learning environments are rapidly expanding the ways we can make the intermediate visible… LEARNING processes How can we better understand these intermediate processes? evidence of process How might we design to foster and capture them?

27. Making Intermediate Thinking Visible

28. Making IntermediateThinking Visible

29. Making Intermediate Thinking Visible

30. Derek Bruff, Vanderbilt University derekbruff.com

31. Derek Bruff (Vanderbilt University) Bruff’s remapping of Cliff Atkinson’s uses of Backchannel: • Note taking • Sharing Resources • Commenting • Amplifying • Asking Questions • Helping One Another • Offering Suggestions • Building community • Opening the Classroom derekbruff.com

32. Connecting Intermediate Processes to Practice NOVICE processes EXPERT practice Social media and intermediate thinking processes Note taking Sharing Resources Commenting Amplifying Asking Questions Helping One Another Offering Suggestions Building community Opening the Classroom How can we better understand these intermediate processes? How do these processes serve as a bridge from novice processes to expert practice?

33. On the use of Twitter in the classroom (Mark Sample, GMU—after Rick Reo, GMU) “Twitter is a Snark Valve” http://www.samplereality.com/

34. Michael Smith & Ali Erkan, Ithaca College • Using Wiki’s to teach history • Students work in collaborative teams to write history wiki-texts on subjects that interest them in historical context

35. Bottleneck(s) in History • Students often have difficulty understanding that history is about constructing an interpretation based on multiple sources and perspectives • They often have trouble making connections between specific details and broader context

36. Michael Smith & Ali Erkan, Ithaca College

37. Michael Smith & Ali Erkan, Ithaca College

38. Michael Smith & Ali Erkan, Ithaca College “Thin Slicing”? “How can students be engaged so that there is meaning in the structure of wikis they produce?” “If there is meaning in the structure of student wikis, how can it be harvested and, subsequently, analyzed?

39. Connecting Intermediate Processes to Expert Practice NOVICE processes EXPERT practice The places we can look for captures of learning are expanding rapidly… LEARNING processes Evidence of gen ed goal? How do you capture the relationship between intermediate engagement and intellectual development? How can we better understand these intermediate processes? How might we design to foster and capture them?

40. High impact practices Experiential Co-curriculum Informal Learning Participatory culture The Formal Curriculum Intermediate -------------------------- Integrative

41. ePortfolio as Social Pedagogy Adaptive Interactive Integrative Recursive Embodied Collaborative

42. Connecting through ePortfolio Student Academic Curriculum Across Semesters External Audiences Faculty & Staff Across Disciplines Lived Curriculum Student

43. ePortfolios as tools and practices for integrating Connect to Learning (FIPSE)

44. Second Wave of the Learning Paradigm • Active Learning: • Theory/ knowing • Experience / doing • Integrative Learning • Theory/ knowing • Experience/ doing • Reflecting / connecting

45. Reflection at the heart of ePorfolio practice

46. Dewey’s Criteria for Reflection • Carol Rodgers has summarized Dewey’s criteria for effective reflection into these four statements: • Reflection as connection • Reflection as systematic and disciplined • Reflection as social pedagogy • Reflection and personal growth

47. Reflection as Connection (1) Reflection is a meaning-making process that moves a learner from one experience into the next with a deeper understanding of its relationship with and connections to other experiences and ideas. It is the thread that makes continuity of learning possible.

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