To “e” or Not to “e” – BCcampus Webcast

I attended a very informative webcast this morning led by Dr. Helen Barrett. The webcast was part of a great series sponsored by the BCcampus EdTech Online Community.

Some of you may remember Dr. Barrett’s very moving keynote address at our e-portfolio event in November. Dr. Barrett will also be providing the keynote address at the BC EdOnline Conference in April. In this morning’s webcast, titled “To ‘e’ or Not to ‘e’: the High School Portfolio”, Dr. Barrett focused on a few core themes:

• the positivist (standardized checklist of skills) versus the constructivist (reflective story of deep learning) approach to e-portfolio development
• the assessment of learning versus the assessment for learning approach to evaluating e-portfolios
• extrinsic versus instrinsic motivations for students

Dr. Barrett suggested some ways to help promote reflection amongst student learners:

• provide models & examples
• begin with forms or prompts; ie., ask a question that students answer
• make use of journals/blogs
• create tasks that challenge learners to integrate new learning into previous learning

An archive of the webcast is available on BCcampus’ website.