The use of ePortfolios in evaluating the curriculum and student learning

Journal of Social Work Education, Fall, 2008 by Dale Fitch, Melissa Peet, Beth Glover Reed, Richard Tolman

* Reflective. Rather than evaluate outcomes, these focus instead on the student's ability to be a reflective practitioner as demonstration of professional growth (Prince, 1994). For example, a social work student in a counseling techniques class might reflect on his or her personal reactions to using various methods.

* Integrative. This type combines the prior two and focuses on integrative, facilitative, and evaluative processes in which students can identify sources of insight, clarify values and goals and, most important, dialogue with and receive feedback from others (peers and faculty) to integrate critical knowledge with action, reflection, and demonstration (Wilcox & Tomei, 1999; Peet, 2005). For example, in a social work capstone course, students might be asked to share their philosophy statements, in which they are asked to integrate their theoretical orientation with their practice methods and state how those two relate to their professional values.

* Structured. In these portfolios a predefined organization exists (i.e., scaffolding) for work that is yet to be created. Learning objectives in most course syllabi are an example of scaffolding. In portfolio work it is the expectation that certain types of artifacts are to be collected, perhaps demonstrating specific competencies, or that specific questions are to be addressed with those artifacts (e.g., an artifact summary). Examples might include a psychosocial assessment, organizational analysis, or a field learning agreement evaluation form; all assignments students typically produce.

* Process or learning. The organization of the work evolves as the work is created. This involves organizing work across and beyond courses, and feedback may be sought from mentors or other outside reviewers. It is the most personal and unstructured type of portfolio (Barron & Sartori, 1994; O'Sullivan & Greene, 2002; Schatz, 2004).

* Showcase or professional. These portfolios are designed specifically to present a student's work, usually in a public setting (e.g., to potential employers). As noted earlier, it is this "end-state" product that people frequently associate with the term portfolio.

Although structured portfolios specifically use scaffolding, most portfolio processes include some kind of scaffolding to help guide student development. Scaffolding may be especially instrumental in helping students reflect on and integrate their various classroom and field experiences (Alvarez & Moxley, 2004; Brown, 2004; Schatz, 2004).

Modes of Delivering Portfolio Instruction

The use of portfolios can be introduced at the beginning of the educational process (Jafari, 2004) so students can learn how to select and reflect on early assignments to gain a better sense of their growth and development as they matriculate through the curriculum. Spicuzza (2000) discusses this approach, in which students are asked to think about what competencies they would like to attain in each assignment. More typically, portfolio courses are offered as an elective during the last term (Barron & Sartori, 1994; Schatz, 2004) or as a required capstone course (Alvarez & Moxley, 2004; Spicuzza, 2000). Alternatively, no course may be offered at all; rather, programs distribute handouts to students during orientation with reminders through the year to identify artifacts--that is, course assignments or other examples of their work--to be reviewed at the end of the year with a faculty advisor (O'Sullivan et al., 2004).