Forum OpenACS Q&A: Re: Portfolio Ideas
Let me toss out a couple of user scenarios that would make sense to me. Let me say that I start with the assumption that I'd want this to be easy to integrate into instruction: to find ways to design it that would lead both students and instructors to say "let's build this into our courses and program". The problem with the Penn State model, as I see it, is that it is a 1997 flatfile technology and self-promotion conception that serves marketing and slight web literacy functions. What I'd like to see would be something that delivers real value for limited user investment. Here goes.
I'd like to see each student and each instructor have e portfolios that, upon joining classes or groups, would automatically provide for integrated functionality.
- For example. An instructor could set up a homework drop box that would appear automatically on each student's site, sort of like what we have now, except that the instructor could, for instance, download all assignments from every student in one zip file.
- Further, that when the instructor does so he gets a list of all students who have submitted files into this assignment drop box, is given the option of sending a notification that says the instructor has collected this stuff and the laggard is now in the status of "laggard", and that at any time the "laggards" could be downloaded as in one zip.
- Further, as an instructor I'd like to be able to browse through all the submitted assignments with an automatic reader window like in the X1 program, which opens .doc, .pdf, and many other formats as you drag through a file list: this way, I could quickly review dozens of homework assignments without having to download them (a bunch of clicks) and open them (a bunch of clicks).
- I'd like to be able to download only those forum entries of a particular student in my class, no matter how many forums and forum threads he is part of, and formatted nicely for printing, so I could collate his written work and group communications.
- I'd like to be able to click through any of these returns and be delivered to the student's site and browse through it without having to become this user.
Now for a general formatting design. Blog is terrific. I think the file storage might have an option that works like the Bookshelf feature whereby with each file or url is a dialogue that asks you to identify the object title and one or more boxes to offer annotatation or commentary, and an expandable display so I would see a list of objects the student has collected, be able to expand them to see his annotations, and even view them like the X1 (or even just the first few lines). Right now, for example, I have a student who is contesting her grade, and I'd like to view and download her four papers and ten forum entries to see her forum participation next to her written work.
The X1 (http://www.x1.com/) viewer I think simply tops, and having tabs like Dotlrn and X1 do but for a student's e-portfolio would allow me to browse quickly through his/her space to get at what he/she has written and so gain, in just a few minutes, an overall impression before downloading and printing a file for more study.
In this way, the instructor would have a very quick, easy way to get through whatever design elements the e-portfolio might make to the text (I'm not talking here about math, music, etc., just text-based courses to start), and if the instructor wants to use this, he or she will more likely make the e portfolio a course requirement. From there, the students can worry about presenting themselves well, and if we structure their spaces in content terms, we will be guiding them to what matters. The UPENN sites suggest that colors and smileys matter, which they do up to a point, but I think the real return is giving students a good reason to present themselves professionally and well, in substantive terms, and insure that by making it very easy for instructors to check them out and offer feedback.
The cost/benefit analysis here is crucial: it has to be easy for the instructor: worry about presenting them with meaningful stuff they can view with no more than two clicks: one to the tab for category, the other to the idem, which magically opens up in the viewer: that's lots of information return with little work. I'd think such integrated functionality would make this applet a killer! What do you think?
All the best, Bruce
