What is an e-Portfolio?

An e-Portfolio is a collection of work published online which can document achievements, accomplishments, ideas, progress, performance, and activities. An e-Portfolio can serve a multitude of purposes by showcasing, publishing and compiling your work to expand on a personal vision or life goal, to create an archive of experiences, to provide documentation for grants, accreditation, or donation – the list goes on and on.

Why create an e-Portfolio?

Many people today, young and old, are empowered by the freedom to publish online. Blogging software has become wildly popular over the last five years as have wikis for use in education, business, and just for fun. Additionally, increasingly popular sites like MySpace and Facebook allow people to easily post images, audio, videos, and communicate with friends. These sites are now a part of almost every high school and college student’s daily life and a central part of their social interactions. It is clear that students want to communicate with a large audience and be part of a greater social network – one that extends beyond their classrooms, their schools, and their hometowns.

E-Portfolios give students the tools to publish within the framework of their achievements, aspirations, educational experiences, and extra-curricular activities. They can create and customize a true online depiction of who they are and who they want to become, where they come from, where they are going and what their plans are to get there. It is a channel for expression that creates a powerful motivation for creating great content to share with their teachers, classmates, college admissions committees, potential employers and the world at large. Content for the portfolio can include papers and presentations for class, digital images of student work or extra-curricular activities, photos from travels to other countries, video clips of students playing sports or musical instruments, descriptions of life goals or involvement in community organizations, and much more.

The process of creating a portfolio not only gives students an opportunity to build necessary technology skills, but also provides an excellent opportunity for acknowledging their strengths, recognizing areas for improvement, setting goals and marking milestones. They are powerful tools for learning and reflection and can provide dynamic platforms for sharing and collaboration.

How to create an e-Portfolio

• Define the purpose of the e-Portfolio. Is it about a specific project in school? Is it for archiving your work across multiple courses or extra-curricular activities? Is it for publishing artwork, writing, or other creative works online? Will it be used to support applications to college, grad school, or employment opportunities? Defining the purpose of your portfolio will help you decipher the most effective way to shape and present the content.
  
  
• Consider your audience when creating an e-Portfolio. Who is going to be able to see the portfolio – just your teacher? Your friends and classmates? Your parents? The world? Understanding your audience will help you to craft the presentation of your work appropriately.

• Clear, consistent organization. Consider the way you will categorize and display information in your portfolio. Do you want to organize you portfolio by time, like a blog? Or with customizable menus, like a website? What is the best possible way that you can group the information you want to share so that it makes sense to your audience? For instance, do you want to display all the work you did in fall semester in one section, and all the work you did in spring semester in another? Or is more important to organize all of your English coursework together and all of your History coursework in another area? Or can you simply have a section called “class work” with your work from courses across many departments? This may seem unimportant, but effective organization is crucial to the development of your e-Portfolio.

• Page layout and design. Your content is the most important aspect of your portfolio – but the way in which it is presented makes a huge impact on how it is perceived and understood by your audience. Do you want to use one kind of page layout for the entire portfolio, or do you want to be able to choose different kinds of page styles for different parts of your portfolio? Do you want to be able to customize images and graphics within your portfolio, or do you just want a standard template? Thinking about the kind of flexibility you want within your portfolio, in terms of page layout and design, will help you select which technology is appropriate.

• Use supporting visuals. Even if much of the content you would like to share in your e-Portfolio is text-based or document-based, like term papers, slide presentations, mathematical formulas or scientific procedures, it is helpful to provide images to support the work you are presenting. You can upload your own photos or find photo and illustration resources online. There are many free, easily searchable, stock image websites where images can be downloaded and saved for use in websites.

• Remember to proofread. This may sound obvious, but it is very important to proofread before publishing your work online. It’s important for you to present yourself and your work as clearly and as professionally as possible. So reread your text, and have some of your friends and colleagues look over it as well.

• Keep it simple. A powerful portfolio is one that clearly presents your content, not one that is filled with more information that is digestible by your audience. Keep text clear and concise. Add supporting graphics and images where it compliments your ideas, not where it will get in the way. If you are including files for your audience to download, try not to make the files too big (no more than 2-5 mb is a general guideline), and mention the file size and file type next to the links to download. Try to find the clearest way to format your portfolio, and make sure it is easy to navigate from page to page.
  

Overall, have fun with your e-Portfolio. Focus on what you want to share about yourself, your life, and your accomplishments. Present your information in a clear, effective, and creative way that tells your audience who you are as a person, not just a name on a resume or a test score on an application. Remember these tips and you will be sure to make a unique impression on whoever sees your e-Portfolio.

Ready to stand apart from the competition? Create your own e-Portfolio!

Here are some tools today for creating e-Portfolios:

• Portfolio Specific software
  
  • ePortfolio
    
  • Digication
  
  
• Blogs
  
  • WordPress
    
  • Blogspot
  
  
• Wikis
  
  • PBwiki
    
  • WetPaint
  
  

-- By Kelly Driscoll, an active educator who helps teachers to develop effective technology skills for improving the teaching and learning experience. She has taught graduate and undergraduate courses at Bryant University and the Rhode Island School of Design, including current courses titled, “Integrating Technology into the Classroom” and “Visual Literacy in Digital Media.” Driscoll also has extensive background in web application development and user interface design, and in 2001 co-founded Digication to develop free, “Simple by Design” e-Portfolio and online classroom technology. For more information, visit www.Digication.com or send the author an email at kdriscoll@digication.com.