Electronic Portfolios: Tools for Learning and the Workplace

1. Electronic Portfolios:Tools for Learning and the Workplace Tracy Penny Light, St. Jerome’s University Bob Sproule, University of Waterloo 2017 The Workplace October 13, 2007

2. Today’s Overview • Electronic Portfolios for Learning • UW Competency Portfolio Project • Developing Competencies in Accounting and Financial Management • Research in Co-op

3. What are Electronic Portfolios? Electronic portfolios (ePortfolios) are collections of digitally represented artifacts that: • document practice • include reflection • integrate experience • map to goals and/or standards • promote deep learning and knowledge transfer

4. Characteristics of Deep Learning • Deep Learning – involves reflection– is developmental– is integrative– is self-directive – is lifelong (Cambridge as quoted in Barrett, 2004):

6. Accounting and Financial Management • Professional “soft-skills” - initially focused on teamwork skills • Brooke • Building on academic skills in the workplace (co-op work terms) • Thermani

7. Accounting and Financial Management • Expanded to include community learning (residence life) • Research focused on 2 areas: • Reflection as a tool for developing competency • Making connections between learning experiences (co-op to academic)

8. Research Project • National Coalition on Electronic Portfolio Research • The University of Waterloo’s context • The University of Waterloo’s research issues: • How does engagement with ePortfolios map against other engagement indicators (NSSE)? • Do ePortfolios assist students to document their learning in different contexts and promote transfer between them? • Do ePortfolios transform how students view learning?

9. Research Project • Reflection is what makes us learners; we need to practice, assess and perfect it. • Four criteria characterize the concept of reflection: • Reflection is a meaning making process • Reflection is systematic, rigorous and disciplined; with roots in scientific inquiry • Reflection needs to happen in community • Reflection requires attitudes that value personal and intellectual growth From: Carol Rodgers, “Defining Reflection: Another Look at John Dewey and Reflective Thinking,” Teachers College Record, 104, 4 (June 2002): 842-866

10. Initial Research Project • Our study group – accounting students starting their academic program in the fall of 2006 • Their work to date – create an ePortfolio and reflections / artifacts to date • Our pilot project group – accounting students who started their academic program in the fall of 2004

11. Contextual Comments • University/College setting tends to focus on the academic setting only. • Professional accounting organizations have developed competencies for their profession. • Government funding for post secondary institutions is increasingly focused on demonstrated learning outcomes. • Our program and curriculum mapping • ePortfolios support higher order thinking consistent with Bloom’s taxonomy. • Changes in our world, as a result of technology and globalization further support the need for integrative learning. • ePortfolios facilitate : connections, benchmark performance and plan for the future. • Importance of feedback

12. Early Results – Initial Project • Making connections by reflecting on one’s experience is a learned skill, one that students need to develop. • The opportunity to make connections will foster development: • “I would just like to say that I never knew just how important the team reflections from AFM 131 would be, until I began preparing for interviews for summer internships at accounting firms. I figured they would ask about teaming [sic] experience (which they did) and I was fully prepared to answer their questions because I referred to what I had wrote [sic] in my team reflections. On a side note, I have received an offer… and I owe a lot of that to the reflections! Virtually all of their questions were about experiences in teams.” Student email, February 25, 2007

13. Early Results – Initial Project • In one-time contexts we need to scaffold student learning. • Expected outcomes that reflections address need to be clearly articulated. • Analysis of the first 3 reflections from the pilot project group show progressive demonstration of: • Meaning making • Reflection in community • Attitudes that value personal and intellectual growth

14. Early Results – Initial ePortfolios need to be program based. ePortfolios provide context to one’s learning. “I had a new perspective on learning, a new appreciation on how my life was connected, and a new tool to organize my thoughts with. I realize now that my personal interests have value in my education, and my education in the way I live my life outside the classroom” From a student, July 2007.

15. Workplace Research • Can ePortfolios supplement or substitute work term reports? • What is the connection between ePortfolios and HR systems designed to track competency/skill development? • How can ePortfolios be useful to employers (before and after hiring)?

16. Conclusions Electronic Portfolios are: • an integrating tool for learning and knowledge transfer • a way to “close the loop” between the academic and workplace (and community) contexts • a tool to develop reflective thinking which promotes life-long learning for the changing workplace

17. Questions?

18. Thank you! Tracy Penny Light tplight@sju.uwaterloo.ca Bob Sproule bsproule@uwaterloo.ca