How Do You Upload Work From Your Google Classroom to Digital Portfolio
Concluding Updated on December 21, 2021
A growing number of visual art students now present their piece of work in an online 'ePortfolio' or 'digital sketchbook'. Digital presentation methods take grown in popularity, due to the recent rising in distance/remote learning, and the increase in digital media within classrooms. A 2020 study, which examined how digital technology was used by art teachers, noted that "the emerging theme from the electronic resources code was digital portfolios."[5] Here we outline the benefits of digital presentation and explain how to create an ePortfolio for students, illustrating some of the best ePortfolio strategies used by high-achieving fine art students from around the world.
What is in this guide? An alphabetize:
- What is an ePortfolio?
- Why are ePortfolios benign for art students in item?
- Things to consider earlier creating an ePortfolio with students
- ePortfolio layout and system tips
- Choosing a platform: requirements for students
- Digital tools and platforms: the all-time online portfolio sites for students
- Bibliography
ePortfolio definition: The word 'ePortfolio' is autograph for 'electronic portfolio,' and is sometimes known as an e-portfolio, eFolio, iFolio, spider web-page, digital sketchbook, digital portfolio, or online portfolio. It is a identify to display artistic piece of work online (artwork, photographs, videos, designs, writing, and so on), and may include hyperlinks, headings, navigation menus, and pages combining visual material and text.
ePortfolios in education: Electronic portfolios for students provide a place for students to record their learning, and so that material can be accessed remotely by a teacher, classmates and others. Student ePortfolios document learning over time, and provide a place to store, analyze and reflect upon piece of work.
An electronic portfolio (e-portfolio) is a purposeful drove of sample pupil work, demonstrations, and artifacts that showcase student's learning progression, accomplishment, and evidence of what students tin practice.
Heart for Teaching & Learning, Berkeley, University of California[1]
In many cases, loftier school art students utilize ePortfolios in a similar manner that is similar to a traditional art sketchbook with visual imagery displayed alongside typed annotation.
ePortfolio development involves problem solving, decision-making, reflection, organization, and disquisitional thinking by students developing a learning 'story' that accurately represents skills learnt and competencies developed.
Dawn Bennett, Diana Blom, Peter Dunbar-Hall, Matthew Robert Hitchcock, Jennifer Rowley, ePortfolios for Creative Arts, Music and Arts Students in Australian Universities (2015) [two]
A well-executed e-portfolio plan is an incredible tool for college education. They provide institutions with authentic assessments of student learning and promote the deeper learning that we desire for our students.
Candyce Reynolds, Associate Professor, quoted within The Benefits of E-portfolios for Students and Faculty in Their Ain Words, Peer Review, Vol. 11, No. 1 (2009)[3]
Although it is well known that artists and designers benefit from displaying their piece of work online (meet our guide to creating an creative person website for more than information virtually this), ePortfolios offer specific advantages to art students in particular:
ePortfolios tin transmit audio and moving image
I of the all-time attributes of an ePortfolio is that, unlike traditional newspaper-based presentation methods, they tin can include audio files, blithe images (such equally GIFs), and video footage, allowing the advice of ideas via audio and movement. As such, ePortfolios are specially popular among students who specialize in filmmaking, digital photography, spider web design, animation, app design, game design, and circuitous multi-media work. Even those specializing in painting and drawing and other two-dimensional formats are able to show videos of work-in-progress, audio presentations, and then on, communicating in ways that are not possible with traditional methods.
Creating an ePortfolio promotes digital literacy and web pattern skills
Many students already create logo designs and other graphic design outcomes as part of their high schoolhouse art programs: website design is a natural extension of this, with options to pattern the site layout, graphics and font. Many loftier schoolhouse qualifications have updated their curriculums to specifically include digital learning. For case, the Cambridge International As and A Level Digital Media and Blueprint syllabus recently added the following area of study: "Mobile and multimedia applications include web and mobile applications, games, interactive media and digital installation." This syllabus, equally do most loftier schoolhouse programs, includes many topics that could form part of an ePortfolio or web blueprint project.
Here is an instance of a last website design by a high school student in New Zealand:
In other words, building an ePortfolio is not simply an culling way of presenting artwork, but can exist an integral way of coming together curriculum requirements, providing "an assessment mode that is more relevant to current and future students in the 21st century."[iv]
Even creating a elementary digital portfolio to display pupil work offers numerous transferrable skills. For example, it encourages the employ of scanners, video cameras, and other digital tools, every bit well every bit editing software, such as Adobe Photoshop. Information technology likewise introduces students to spider web design or blogging software (run across below for a detailed discussion on the different ePortfolio platforms that are recommended for students). Having these skills gives students a leg up, regardless of the field they cease up inbound.
ePortfolios reduce printing and reproduction costs
Graphic blueprint and photography students typically face very high printing costs, with students having to print out material for every assessment. Combined with the cost of a camera and software licenses, this can make such courses prohibitive for many students. Presenting piece of work via an ePortfolio, however, eases this burden dramatically. When work is shared and assessed electronically, printings costs can be reduced significantly, with printing merely taking place for terminal submission or exhibition pieces, for example. This also avoids the rush of 20-30 students queuing for the printer, and is environmentally friendly to kicking.
Work can be viewed remotely, without transporting of bulky physical items required
ePortfolios are non simply helpful for those studying digital arts, but those specializing in more hands-on disciplines, such as drawing, painting, sewing, fabric design, sculpture and 3D Design. With face-to-face learning currently disrupted in many parts of the globe, having a streamlined electronic system for displaying and sharing pupil work is helpful, particularly when traditional sketchbooks, fine art supplies, and finished artworks are often bulky and difficult to transport. Even in ordinary circumstances, a mixture of digital and hard-copy submission can aid with space, storage and transportation problems in decorated classrooms.
We accept kids upload photos of their artwork and practice essays and critiques, that manner so that there is a lot less paper to comport around, a lot less trying to shop artwork with that many students since we have such a large department and classroom space is limited.
Anonymous high school instructor, quoted past Jesse Strycker, K-12 Art Teacher Engineering science Use and Preparation, ScienceDirect (2020)[5]
Piece of work can exist viewed by many people at any time, fostering constructive critique and in-process feedback
Many ePortfolio platforms have comment functionality built in, allowing students and teachers to offer productive written feedback (annotate functionality tin exist switched off, if moderation becomes a problem). This is especially successful with students who are less confident most providing verbal feedback in class. Teachers notation that many savour the depression-pressure nature of sharing critique online.
Accessing work via an ePortfolio, without the student needing to exist present, likewise allows teachers to provide private formative feedback more readily than is ever possible in a decorated classroom situation.
The process of giving and receiving feedback was rapid and easy, and meant students were able to obtain more individual feedback than had previously been possible, and in a timely fashion, increasing its effectiveness (Gibbs, 2010).
Dawn Theresa Nicholson, Enhancing educatee engagement through online portfolio cess, Practitioner Research in College Instruction (2018) [4]
Within classrooms, ePortfolios can be projected onto a large screen, or viewed on private computers, as Sandy De La Rosa describes:
ePortfolios tin can increase pupil engagement
An interesting written report[4] recently compared two groups of university students, both of whom were asked to consummate the same tasks. One group had to submit their work via a paper-based portfolio; the other via an ePortfolio. (This study ran across two years, with over 200 students in total, randomly dissever into groups). Teachers fabricated the important observation that those who completed an ePortfolio were less likely to get out their piece of work until the last minute. It was suspected that this was because students knew that their teachers would periodically expect at their ePortfolio, only never knew exactly when, so they worked more regularly to go on their portfolio updated, just in case the teacher checked it. Teachers also noted that classroom discussions were often more productive, because "students had already read and acted upon feedback."
Students made progress on their portfolios calendar week by week instead of leaving it all to the end. This was considering they knew their sites were going to get displayed the following week…. and too considering they knew I was looking at their sites and prodding them if they hadn't done the work.
Anonymous tutor, quoted past Dawn Theresa Nicholson, Enhancing educatee engagement through online portfolio assessment, Practitioner Enquiry in Higher Education (2018)[four]
In a high schoolhouse setting, it is not but the teacher who might viewing and comment upon an ePortfolio in real-fourth dimension, only classmates, parents, and peers. This increased feedback can result in increased levels of engagement. This finding is backed upward by another 2018 study which found that ePortfolios promoted an "increase in student date and communication with the added benefit of connected learning in the secondary art classroom."[six]
ePortfolios can double as a career portfolio, improving employment prospects
Many art students earn money from creative pursuits while studying, such equally offer photography services, videography, or painting portraits for friends and peers. If an ePortfolio is prepare up during high school, it can assistance students marketing their skills and achievements to potential clients and employers. An ePortfolio of this nature could include a resume and creative person argument, alongside collections of artwork. (Please note that students should exist very careful about uploading contact phone numbers and other identifying details – see our discussion almost net prophylactic below.)
In fact, ePortfolios are considered then valuable for academy students, that many institutions now require students to create these as part of their course[7] – in a wide range of disciplines, from educational activity/teaching, music, to science.
…more four in 5 employers say an electronic portfolio would be useful to them in ensuring that job applicants take the noesis and skills they need to succeed in their visitor or organization.
Hart Research Associates, It Takes More a Major: Employer Priorities for Higher Learning and Educatee Success (2013)[8]
Senior high school students who are actively looking to enroll in college or academy (see our guide to creating an awarding portfolio for college or university) can hence find creating an ePortfolio an excellent fashion to link learning to real-world goals.
[At] an urban high school in northeastern Georgia, students frequently complained near their perceived disconnection between classwork and the value of these assignments beyond high schoolhouse; students made frequent remarks almost ELA assignments like, "I'll never have to do this afterwards high school." Because of these concerns, the researcher implemented an ePortfolio with a reflection on transferable skills as an intervention to help students reflect on the transferable skills practiced within loftier school coursework and its value in their futurity endeavors in college or a career. …[]… Findings from both the quantitative and qualitative information revealed that the ePortfolio with a reflection on transferable skills positively afflicted high school students' perceptions of college and career readiness in their high school.
Julie Beatrice Kristin, I'll Never Have to Practice This After High Schoolhouse: Exploring Students' Perceptions of College and Career Readiness and the Effects of Eportfolios With Reflection on Transferable Skills (2020)[9]
ePortfolios can be used as promotional tools inside the wider schoolhouse and customs
Parents and school management teams are often impressed at the professional person appearance of educatee ePortfolios. Online material can be projected onto large screens at open days and career nights, providing a 'virtual window' into the classroom, offering great marketing opportunities for the Art & Design section. Links to student ePortfolios can exist fabricated available from the school or teacher websites for similar reasons. Links to ePortfolios past past students can also showcase outstanding performance in various creative fields.
ePortfolios can streamline the grading procedure, collating piece of work in a single location
Art teachers sometimes experience like tearing their hair out attempting to assess student work that is scattered across several locations (a finished video clip on YouTube; obscurely labelled files in online folders; hardcopy drawings in a sketchbook; items on a misplaced thumb drive; and over-sized files fastened via email). This tin can become a logistical nightmare when collating and assessing piece of work from hundreds of students.
An online ePortfolio acts as a central hub, collating all piece of work by a single educatee in 1 location (YouTube videos can be embedded, paradigm files uploaded, annotation added directly alongside, and even concrete artworks can be scanned an added).
Each separate assignment of sub-unit of work can be presented upon a single ePortfolio page, with the teacher scrolling upwardly or downward as required to view the entire submission. With this method, each student 'submits' only a single link for cess. Inboxes are not clogged; files do not need to exist painstakingly opened one at a time. The teacher opens the appropriate link, and the entire submission is visible – images, multi-media, and text, arranged upon a single portfolio page.
Although critiquing student work from unmarried ePortfolio page is often not as simple as assessing hardcopy piece of work directly in front of y'all, it is far meliorate than other digital alternatives. Information technology also has the advantage that teachers don't need to carry armloads of work to-and-from school, and can form anywhere that they have internet access. This submission technique likewise allows regular determinative feedback to be given via annotate features, as described above.
Updating and modifying work is like shooting fish in a barrel
A digital portfolio can be edited, improved and updated as the form progresses, providing a flexible digital document to accompany hardcopy sketchbooks.
Students have been stuffing assignments in notebooks and folders for years, so what's then new and exciting about portfolios? Portfolios capitalize on students' natural trend to save work and become an constructive manner to get them to take a 2d await and recall about how they could improve hereafter work. Equally any teacher or student can confirm, this method is a articulate departure from the erstwhile write, hand in, and forget mentality, where outset drafts were considered final products.
David Sweet, Student Portfolios: Classroom Uses, Educational activity Research Consumer Guide (1993)[ten]
At that place are several issues to consider earlier creating an ePortfolio with high school students, particularly if this is to exist live on the net, accessible by the public. (Well-nigh ePortfolio platforms have the ability to set these as either public or individual.)
Internet safety and privacy: seek parental permission and ensure no contact details are included
Sharing piece of work online involves potential complications with internet rubber and privacy. Information technology is vital that students and their families consent to sharing of work via the digital platform and understand what the ePortfolio will involve. Teachers should familiarize themselves with school policies effectually sharing student piece of work with third parties.
Students should ensure that phone numbers, age, addresses and other identifying details are not included within their ePortfolio. If creating an ePortfolio for marketing purposes, where students want to encourage potential clients, a 'contact course' should be used, rather than making an email address publicly visible (automated bots crawl the internet 'harvesting' electronic mail addresses, then that they tin can be sold to others for spam email purposes, so publishing an email addresses online is not advised).
Some schools request that students do not include their total proper name, and use only an initial for their surname, however, a total name can be helpful for building an online presence, so as long every bit no contact details are included, this is usually okay.
Ensure content is appropriate for a classroom situation: respectful linguistic communication, inoffensive imagery
One of the most of import things students must understand before posting content to an online ePortfolio is that what goes online, stays online. It is proficient practice to presume that everything published on the internet (whether to social media, a 'private' Facebook grouping, your own ePortfolio, or otherwise) might be seen by vast numbers of people, and that, one time uploaded, you may never exist able to remove it or undo it. Numerous automated robots, as well as humans, copy and duplicate digital material, and sometimes the about unexpected content goes viral. Furthermore, the 'WayBack Machine' takes permanent snapshots of web pages, archiving the internet, and then that web pages tin exist accessed at a afterwards date even if the material is later taken offline. In short, in one case material is uploaded to the internet, it is often in that location permanently, and the original uploader loses control over how it is used or shared. In rare cases, you tin can quickly delete cloth before anyone else has seen it, simply you should not count on this. Even isolated comments on someone else's website may come back to haunt, as this man discovered:
…he has commented on someone else'southward mail and been very offensive towards them. His comments were rude and ill thought out, and were made some half dozen years ago. He has now realised his comments can be found in Google when a search is made for his name – something he didn't think would happen when he made the comments.
Darren Jamieson, What happens online stays online (2016)[11]
Questionable content posted online tin compromise students not just in the nowadays, but in the future – in unanticipated means. For this reason, schoolhouse administration / management are more likely to become involved if objectionable content is shared with an ePortfolio than had the same textile been shared in a hardcopy classroom sketchbook – because the ramifications are much more serious.
It is worth remembering that about students share content online on a regular ground anyhow, and will continue to do and then, whether they are granted permission to create an ePortfolio as function of a school project or not. Hence, this task provides an excellent opportunity to help students develop responsible strategies for communicating online.
Protect against plagiarism
If work from artists or other individuals is included or quoted inside an ePortfolio, this should be formally referenced, as within any other academic project.
At that place is sometimes the worry that students from one school might plagiarise the work of students from another. Some teachers get around this by having the online portfolio as an stop-of-year project that takes place later piece of work after has been formally submitted – or by having the portfolios accessible online, but not discoverable by search engines, so that the ePortfolio cannot exist easily found by others (the portfolio tin then be made public once the grade is complete). It is worth noting, however, that many high schoolhouse art projects are inspired by multiple practising artists, with ideas developed under the guidance of a instructor in original directions. Hence, mimicking of artwork by single student is hence not usually a major business organization.
Verification of ownership: Include screenshots of work in progress and back-trail digital submissions with physical artwork
Many qualifications crave a school or principal to verify the authenticity of pupil piece of work before it is submitted for external cess. This tin can be more challenging when piece of work is submitted digitally, because it is harder to know whether piece of work has been copied from elsewhere. For this reason, students should document piece of work in progress – showing screenshots at diverse stages of completion.
It is also helpful to accompanying digital submissions with hardcopy sketchbooks or artwork, to help to verify ownership of digital piece of work.
Balance screen time with easily-on creation
In that location are valid concerns about the number of hours young people spend online – something that is only escalating with the lockdowns taking identify in many parts of the world. Long hours online and the distraction of social media tin can affect mood and slumber, compromising productivity and quality of work overall. This is an important consideration when making a choice about what role an ePortfolio volition play in the classroom.
There is an immediacy and joy in creating easily-on artwork that is sometimes defective when interfacing between keyboard and screen. Fine art students often love the chance to interact with physical media, using their easily to create things – experiencing surface and texture and touch. Creating physical artworks allows the spontaneous transfer of ideas past manus, and strengthens and consolidates practical art-making techniques.
For this reason, students might choose to delay ePortfolio creation until the senior years of high schoolhouse, leaving the earlier determinative years to focus predominantly upon practical art-making skills. Even senior students creating digital art courses do good from sketching and experimenting with physical media alongside the cosmos of an digital work (this likewise helps with verifying ownership of work, equally noted above).
Backup the ePortfolio
Digital files used within an ePortfolio should be stored on a retention stick or cloud server (an automated backup service, such as Dropbox, is recommended). It is likewise wise to print a copy of each ePortfolio folio. These printouts tin be bound and submitted so that examiners have a concrete copy in case of technological difficulties.
Not all teachers find assessing student ePortfolios straightforward – with some commenting that information technology sometimes feels similar a "wild goose chase" to locate the appropriate particular for assessment.[iv] The process is much easier if teachers utilise a consistent grade-wide ePortfolio structure and page-labelling, equally this enables teachers to navigate directly to the appropriate folio in each student's ePortfolio without hiccup.
In the evaluation, staff expressed stiff feelings about the marker process. For some, the process was much improved, while for others, more challenging. The difference appeared to chronicle largely to the arrangement, structure, and formatting of students' web sites:
How well the students prepare up the WordPress site, and how they chose to post their portfolio elements, made a significant difference to how easy it was to review work.
Dawn Theresa Nicholson, Enhancing student date through online portfolio cess, Practitioner Research in Higher Education, Vol. 11, No. 1 (2018)[4]
There are no fixed rules nigh how to set up up an ePortfolio, withal most good ePortfolios apply a like layout and organizational structure. This helps teachers and assessors navigate around the site and view the piece of work without difficulty.
If the purpose and assessment criteria of portfolio are not clear, the portfolio can be merely a miscellaneous collection of works that tin can't reflect students' growth or accomplishment accurately.
Adnan Baki, Osman Birgin, The Utilize of Portfolio to Assess Student's Functioning (2007)[12]
Make a new page for each assignment or unit of work
Students should not haphazardly dump work within the ePortfolio, nor space work out beyond hundreds of disconnected pages. Information technology is advantageous to publish each assignment or unit of piece of work on its own page, integrating artist inquiry, annotation, reflections, and collections of images and ideas in the one location. This allows the marker to coil up and down to appraise the work, without having to click back and forward betwixt multiple pages. (This is skillful practice for professional career ePortfolios too, equally having more content on a unmarried folio makes information technology easier for Google to understand what each page is about and helps bulldoze traffic to your website – more than tips for growing traffic to an artist website volition discussed in an upcoming article).
Include a menu, with conspicuously labelled navigation links
Include a navigation menu at the acme of the screen (above or beneath the main heading) with links to unlike sections of work within the ePortfolio. A drop-down carte can be used to group pages together in categories and sub-categories. The bill of fare should employ clear, easily-understood diction. Teachers ofttimes accept specific rules and naming protocols for menu items, and then that they tin locate work without difficulty.
Bill of fare items should exist ordered sequentially, to bear witness progression of ideas, and should include a link to the dwelling house page, and other primal pages (such as an 'Virtually Me' and 'Contact' page, which are useful for those wishing to utilize the ePortfolio for career purposes). A second menu can also exist included in the footer of the site (at the very bottom of the page).
Ensure content views well upon different screen sizes, with images and text clearly visible
Sometimes as a browser resizes, images and text bound positions, then that what worked well on one screen does not view well on another. Students should resize their browser and view on dissimilar devices, to check how the work displays at other screen sizes.
It is hard for examiners to appraise work when simply part of an image is visible at one time. Remember that examiners are likely to assess pupil piece of work upon a desktop. If you take tall, narrow artwork, reduce the file size so that the entire artwork is visible on a single horizontal screen. If fine details are not visible at this scale, separate photos tin be added showing shut-upwards details.
When annotating artwork, it is helpful if the images are visible on the screen at the same time as the text, so it is articulate which images are being discussed.
Use hyperlinks to connect dissimilar parts of the portfolio and link to external websites
Hyperlinks play an important function in helping Google's search algorithm understand online content, and assistance an ePortfolio be visible in search engines – oftentimes an of import goal for students wishing to abound their online presence and develop an art career. Hyperlinks also help teachers and assessors navigate their way around your site.
When referencing work from others, it is good etiquette to link to the original source, and then that those wishing to seek more data tin click through and visit the advisable website.
Utilize a simple presentation fashion
A creative ePortfolio is more than simply a place to dump work – the presentation matters. Put thought into color and font selection, aiming for piece of cake readability. When arranging content on pages, think that overcrowded work or tiny font sizes may brand it difficult for examiners to assess work. As with a traditional sketchbook, a clean, minimalist aesthetic is desirable, as this does not distract from the artwork (more ideas about presentation can be found in our guide to creating an outstanding high school sketchbook).
Introduce the projection on the 'Dwelling house' page
The front page of the ePortfolio is likely to be the starting time matter that an examiner will meet. Use this equally an opportunity to summarise the project and outline the purpose of their ePortfolio, adding links to the different primal areas of the project.
Add an 'About Me' folio
An About Me page is especially of import in the instance of a career portfolio. Students can add information nigh themselves here, including the creative services they offer. Students may also include a photo of themselves (many choose to have the face obscured or subconscious for privacy reasons).
Hither is office of the text used on an About Me ePortfolio instance past a higher pupil seeking to promote her work and gain clients:
Hello and welcome! I'one thousand glad you're hither!
My name'south Carter Teal, possessor and primary lensman of Carter Teal Photography! I'g currently a college student at The Ohio State University pursuing a field in their Pattern plan. I'm based in Central Ohio and I shoot weddings, couples, portraits, families, and much more than!
Carter Teal, Carter Teal Photography
When selecting where to brand an ePortfolio with students, the following should be considered:
The ePortfolio should exist portable, so students can use information technology beyond graduation
Ideally, student ePortfolios should not be tied to schoolhouse systems, so they are accessible one time students accept left school – making them helpful for both college and academy applications, and beyond. Although material tin can be manually copied and paste material from in-house platforms for hereafter employ, doing this at calibration, with multiple students is impractical.
The case was made that PGCE students would be entering the earth of work the following year and therefore should have immediate access to their portfolios as continuous professional development tools…
Magda Barnard and Sonja Strydom, A tale of two faculties: Exploring pupil experiences of e-portfolio implementation every bit a vehicle of reflective learning at Stellenbosch University, The Independent Journal of Teaching and Learning, Vol. 12, No. ii (2017)[13]
The platform must be reliable, robust, and secure
A stable, well-established digital platform is essential. The longer a platform has been operating, with an agile user base of operations, the more likely it is to be secure, without bugs and technical problems. Popular platforms are also accompanied by a huge array of tutorials and training videos to help when students get stuck.
The platform must be simple to use
Young people are ofttimes described as 'digital natives', yet a platform used with high school students must cater towards all skill levels and be sufficiently straight forward and convenient.
…despite engaging with so-called 'millennials', it was articulate that the supposition could not be fabricated that all the students were comfortable with the required technologies and that they knew how to utilise them as expected. …[]…most of the cohort asked for a more than easily-on training feel related to multimedia skills (e.g. adding images, videos and audio clips) and granting admission to their respective portfolios at the start of the project…
Magda Barnard and Sonja Strydom, A tale of two faculties: Exploring student experiences of e-portfolio implementation as a vehicle of reflective learning at Stellenbosch Academy, The Independent Journal of Teaching and Learning, Vol. 12, No. 2 (2017)[thirteen]
The platform must be flexible and customizable
Art students are bang-up to add together their own mark to their creations. This is especially critical if students hope to utilise an ePortfolio for enhancing their career after graduation. The best ePortfolio platforms let room for self-expression, selecting different layouts, fonts, colors and then on.
The platform should have comment functionality
As noted above, engagement is often driven past comments and responses from teachers and classmates. You may wish to ensure it is possible to switch comments on and off, every bit desired.
The platform should be complimentary or inexpensive to apply
Free ePortfolio websites for students are popular for obvious reasons, yet these come with downsides that must be considered likewise. Some schools employ savings fabricated in printing budgets to cover costs of high-quality ePortfolio platforms. Both paid and premium options, with their pros and cons, are discussed beneath.
It can be helpful to use the same platform school-wide
If yous are creating ePortfolios within the classroom, having all students select the same platform makes teaching and grading more than efficient. Teachers tin use a common set of resources between yr levels (some teachers also create their ain website using the same platform, modelling good practice for students and learning how to use the platform together). A school-wide policy means that students all go familiar with the same platform – so changing classes and year levels doesn't involve relearning how to utilize some other platform all once more.
When students spend more than one twelvemonth working with digital portfolios, they larn and know the tool. This ways students aren't bogged downwards with learning the technical stuff. They will become fluent with the technology and be able to concentrate on creation, curation, reflection, connections, and all the things that volition really bulldoze their learning.
Greg Port, Why ePortfolios, All Saints' Higher (2020)[xiv]
There is an almost infinite assortment of digital tools and software that for making an ePortfolio. Here we talk over their pros and cons, discussing their usefulness within the classroom, and illustrating how some of the all-time ePortfolio platforms have been used within high school fine art programmes.
Epitome-sharing platforms, such as Google Photos, Instagram, Flickr, Padlet, Pinterest, or Artsonia
There are many online platforms where images can be uploaded and organised in folders. These provide a place to store and share images, and are sometimes used by students to generate a elementary online portfolio. Teachers and students sometimes create accounts and and then follow each other, or contribute to shared folders, groups, or noticeboards. Some of these platforms, such every bit Google Photos and Flickr, retain technical information about each photo (such equally the photographic camera model, aperture, and so on) which is helpful for photography students.
Padlet and Pinterest allow users to create collaborative online noticeboards or collections, where students and teachers can post images, videos, and links. Padlet has both gratis and premium versions (a paid teacher license is available), with the free Padlet version express to only 3 noticeboards. Padlet has an improved ability to manage harassment and privacy (you can ensure that content is 'approved' before information technology is published, for example), making it suitable for utilise in classroom situations, particularly with junior students.
Artsonia is a website where student artwork tin can exist uploaded to galleries, and then printed upon various products (such as cups, magnets, T-shirts etc), fundraising for schools in the process. Some teachers utilize this to create basic online portfolios for students. It sometimes takes a lot of time to ready up and manage permissions, yet when students upload their own work using their phones this makes the process much easier.
Public image-sharing platforms, similar Pinterest and Instagram, expose students to content from a wide range of users, which can be inappropriate or distracting.
At that place are three main difficulties with these epitome-sharing platforms, when it comes to ePortfolio creation. Firstly, multiple images and text cannot be hands arranged in sequence upon a unmarried portfolio page, making them unsuitable for many high school programs. Secondly, it is not easy to link or navigate between unlike sections of the portfolio, or organize content into categories and sub-categories. Thirdly, these platforms do not make it easy to optimize content for search engines, and so people are less likely to discover your work while searching in Google. This makes them unsuitable for those students who are looking to create an ePortfolio to promote their career in the future.
School-based platforms such as Canvas or Seesaw
Another alternative is to use your current learning management software for ePortfolio creation. Some students utilize Canvas to submit digital art and graphic pattern assignments (Colorado State University has published a skillful guide for how to make an ePortfolio on Canvas). Seesaw is another platform that enables students to turn in artwork, with images to be organized in folders and viewable as a public online gallery, with students integrating images, video, text and so on. Other popular school-based platforms include Google Classroom, Edmodo, or Schoology. The disadvantages of these options is that ePortfolios remain tied to the school learning management system, and are not an hands transportable portfolio that is useful for higher applications or career promotion going frontward. As with the content-sharing platforms to a higher place, these approaches are all-time used with inferior students, or those who are less serious about embarking upon a creative career.
Slideshow tools, such equally PowerPoint and Google Slides
Slide-sharing platforms let students to make a digital presentation in the form of a digital slideshow. This involves a combination of scanned drawings and paintings, photographs, digital artwork, embedded videos and 'voice overs', assembled aslope reflections, analysis and other typed annotation. Digital slideshows can exist presented to class for discussion and critique, or used for higher applications. Some high school qualifications, such as IB Visual Fine art, crave students to submit a serial of screen-based slides for assessment, using software such as PowerPoint.
Google Slides is much like PowerPoint, except that students can share links to their presentation or embed these inside a blog post, making them more than transportable. Students tin create presentations using a template created by the instructor, if required. Teachers frequently find that Google Slides is easy for students to use, with a low learning-curve, although there are complaints virtually the way Google Slides compresses images, which can leave images blurry.
Ane issue with using slide-sharing tools is that submitting an entire year'south work in a single slideshow makes for a very long, heavy document. Some schools thus ask student to submit a split up slideshow for each unit of piece of work. Although slideshow tools can be used to create complex, high-quality presentations, different an ePortfolio website, they cannot be hands used to grow exposure online and are hence not as useful for career purposes.
Professional portfolio platforms such as Adobe Artistic Cloud Limited or Behance
Another pick is to utilise i of the costless platforms used by artists and designers, such as Behance or Adobe Creative Deject Limited (formerly known as Adobe Spark). These allow y'all to combine images and text upon website pages (enabling you to scroll down to run across all content, rather than clicking through page after page). These are published online, easily shareable with others, and can be retained by the students after they leave school.
Platforms such equally Adobe Creative Cloud Express and Behance are typically aesthetically pleasing and easy to utilize, so students tin can go up and running with ease. Students often find it motivating to accept their piece of work published alongside that of practicing artists and designers (and experience as if they are creating a 'existent' portfolio) which tin encourage high-quality portfolio cosmos.
Here is an excellent Adobe Spark tutorial by Blueprint and Photography teacher Stacey Churchill, describing how she uses ePortfolios within the classroom):
Note: Exercise non make the mistake of confusing Adobe Spark with Adobe Portfolio. A number of teachers take had students use Adobe Portfolio, but to notice at the end of the project that it won't let students publish their portfolio without payment.
At that place are two problems with these free portfolio platforms. Firstly, they typically have very limited customization options. Many senior high school students find these platforms not flexible enough for their needs. Adobe Spark likewise doesn't let comments and students cannot 'similar' images, which some teachers discover reduces engagement within the classroom. Almost importantly, nonetheless, ePortfolios created using these platforms cannot exist easily optimized for search engines, and then it is hard for others to find the portfolio when searching in Google. This means these platforms take express usefulness if students hope to apply the ePortfolio to grow a client base and promote themselves in the time to come.
A gratis spider web design platform such every bit Wix, Weebly, Google Sites or Blogger
Creating a stand-alone website is the best pick for senior high school students who wish to create an ePortfolio. Many students use a free web design platforms, such as Google Sites, Blogger, Weebly, or Wix. These platforms have drag-and-drop editors, so students can create a website without any HTML or coding required.
Wix or Weebly are the most versatile of these options, and have a professional, aesthetically pleasing appearance, resulting in a site that can be kept following graduation, useful for scholarships and college applications. Both Wix and Weebly have gratis and premium options.
Here is an excellent Weebly ePortfolio example past a senior loftier schoolhouse educatee:
Another option is Google Sites (this is the best Google service for creating an ePortfolio).
Wondering how to create an ePortfolio using google sites? Here is a not bad tutorial by Eric Neely, English language teacher at The Academies of Bryan Station High Schoolhouse, Kentucky, United States:
Google sites is very easy to employ, however some detect information technology challenging to share student portfolio Google Sites with others (one teacher described "constantly dealing with blocking issues when they wanted to ship to family members or outside agencies"). If a site is created using a pupil's school login, a copy of the site can exist shared with their personal Gmail business relationship when the educatee leaves, and so they can retain it once they leave school, even so this requires a few steps and may become a hassle when portfolios are created by multiple students. Other schools cannot apply Google Sites at all (those designated as 'Microsoft schools' for instance), because their students don't utilize Gmail accounts. Some teachers take also commented that students cannot upload images straight from their telephone to Google Sites – work must be saved in Google Bulldoze and so uploaded them to Google Sites, pregnant an actress stride in the process.
Another Google platform that tin can be used to create a website is Blogger. This is an older platform, however it is still used past some students and teachers.
A problem encountered by many teachers wanting to create an ePortfolio for students is that a growing number of free platforms are blocked past schools. Sometimes, students or teachers spend considerable effort building upwards a website or ePortfolio, or are halfway through a projection, when the platform is suddenly blocked past their school, as loftier school photography teacher Wendy Dark-brown McElfish discovered first-hand:
Gratis ePortfolio platforms are oft blocked by schools because these sites attract spammers, who wait for cheap and like shooting fish in a barrel ways to set up dodgy websites. To protect students from exposure to these spammy sites, the whole platform itself is often blocked and inaccessible past students.
To complicate things further, many regions are bringing in laws and regulations relating to online education, which means that sure platforms are no longer able to be used with students. For instance, teachers in New York State were recently told they were unable to apply Weebly anymore, every bit this is not compliant with the new 2020 NYS data collection privacy law. Other teachers are no longer able to apply Wix with their students, due to new historic period restrictions brought in, with some teachers simply permit those older than 18 to publish a site.
Another downside of edifice an ePortfolio with these tools, is that costless platforms are prone to shut down unexpectedly. For case, Weebly recently appear that their education plan (which enabled teachers to manage and view student websites) will shortly be discontinued, with all educatee sites and accounts disabled. Students volition not be able to export their websites, requiring students to manually cut and paste all textile if they wish to proceed their content.
[Weebly] will no longer support pupil accounts after Baronial 1st, 2022. Students will not be able to log in, and their websites will be unpublished. Nosotros'll delete any student information in your account…
As some other instance, Wikispaces, which was one of the largest educational wiki sites used by teachers, suddenly disabled all free and classroom wikis in 2018:
Every bit stated in our communication in January 2018 and subsequent site banners; every bit of July 31st, 2018 all Free and Classroom Wikis were disabled and are no longer accessible.
Free website platforms are especially vulnerable to collapse, considering they exercise non directly generate revenue for the visitor. When times are tough, complimentary services are often the get-go to exist cut. Such abrupt changes tin have rather dramatic effects upon teaching programs, when hundreds of students might be midway through projects using a detail platform for their course.
Another downside of using one of these platforms is that Google does not similar to show costless websites in search engines (ePortfolios made using these tools are hence non very useful for driving traffic or growing clients – come across more about this in our guide to creating an artist website) and optimizing content for search engines is difficult. This makes ePortfolios congenital with Wix, Weebly, and Google Sites far less useful for students who are keen to embark upon a creative career, because it is much harder to drive traffic to these websites.
WordPress (highly recommended)
WordPress is one of the most popular website building tools, and powers about 38% of all websites on the cyberspace (the Student Fine art Guide was created using WordPress). It can be used to create whatsoever type of website, with written text, illustrated articles, scrolling images, image galleries, embedded video clips, and then on. WordPress is more complicated than Wix and Weebly, only is well inside the capabilities of many senior high school students. By comparison, it is easier to utilise than other digital tools students ofttimes utilise, such every bit Adobe Photoshop.
Many teachers give students a choice betwixt Wix, Weebly, Google Sites, and WordPress. One loftier school instructor comments, "Wix seems to be the crowd favorite, with some of my avant-garde students using WordPress." Another writes, "Been using Wix for several years. WordPress for the real serious kids."
Important advantages of WordPress include:
- A WordPress website tin can exist optimized for online search engines, making it easier for others to discover your artwork when they search in Google. (This is why WordPress is the best option for practising artists).
- Students can have their ain website name (this is called a 'domain proper name'), such every bit yourname.com. This creates a much more professional impression than yourname.freeservice.com.
- If students make up one's mind to sell artwork in the future, they can easily add buy now buttons or shopping carts and sell directly from their WordPress site (this is not possible from the free platforms described above).
- An nearly space range of features tin can be added to a WordPress website – contact forms, email sign-up boxes, social media share buttons and then on. All of these are invaluable and are difficult or impossible to implement on most complimentary platforms, enabling students to turn their ePortfolio is a professional person website.
In fact, WordPress is considered and then useful for students that a growing number of high schools now offer WordPress specific courses. Loftier school teacher Zac Gordon, for instance, describes instruction students to build websites for clients in the customs, and began an internship program, where students started their ain companies working on WordPress sites for clients.
There are 2 versions of WordPress – the bones, costless version, which is found at WordPress.com (this has many of the same limitations as the other free platforms described above), and self-hosted WordPress, which is installed at a 'website host'. A website host is a company that offers infinite for a website to be stored online so your site is live on the net. Beginner hosting costs approximately $5 a month (see recommendations for hosting providers at the cease of this commodity – the same hosting providers we recommend for artists). This price is within the reach of some loftier school students – particularly when savings in press are considered. (Some teachers add website hosting to the course fees at the beginning of the year, in replace of a reduced print budget.)
The Educatee Art Guide will before long exist publishing a free WordPress form for high school students, containing all resource and lesson plans needed to teach WordPress within the classroom. This volition be an online course that students and teachers tin can follow along at their ain pace. It volition teach students how to build a website with WordPress, and volition include lesson plans covering the many ways in which spider web blueprint tin exist utilized within the curriculum – such as logo design, website layout design, and digital branding etc. We hope to publish this course in 2022. In the meantime, students may wish to spotter the video tutorial nosotros have created for artists explaining how to set up a WordPress website.
Note: We are great to feature more than student websites, particularly WordPress ePortfolio examples, within this article. Practice you accept examples or experience using WordPress within the classroom that yous would like to share? Have your students designed websites as office of their high school curriculum? Delight make contact via our contact form! We would love to hear from you lot.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
[one] E-Portfolio, Middle for Instruction & Learning, Berkeley, University of California
[2] Dawn Bennett, Diana Blom, Peter Dunbar-Hall, Matthew Robert Hitchcock, Jennifer Rowley, ePortfolios for Creative Arts, Music and Arts Students in Australian Universities (2015)
[three] Candyce Reynolds, Associate Professor, quoted within The Benefits of E-portfolios for Students and Faculty in Their Own Words, Peer Review, Vol. 11, No. 1 (2009)
[4] Dawn Theresa Nicholson, Enhancing student appointment through online portfolio assessment, Practitioner Research in College Education, Vol. 11, No. ane (2018)
[5] Jesse Strycker, Thousand-12 Art Teacher Technology Use and Grooming, ScienceDirect (2020)
[6] Megan Johnson and Maia Skarphol, The Effects of Digital Portfolios and Flipgrid on Student Date and Communication in a Connected Learning Secondary Visual Arts Classroom (2018)
[7] Planning & Developing Your Public Portfolio, Louisiana Country University
[8] Hart Research Associates, It Takes More than a Major: Employer Priorities for College Learning and Student Success (2013)
[nine] Julie Beatrice Kristin, I'll Never Accept to Practice This After Loftier Schoolhouse: Exploring Students' Perceptions of College and Career Readiness and the Effects of Eportfolios With Reflection on Transferable Skills (2020)
[10] David Sugariness, Student Portfolios: Classroom Uses, Education Inquiry Consumer Guide (1993)
[xi] Darren Jamieson, What happens online stays online (2016)
[12] Adnan Baki, Osman Birgin, The Use of Portfolio to Assess Educatee's Functioning (2007)
[13] Magda Barnard and Sonja Strydom, A tale of two faculties: Exploring educatee experiences of e-portfolio implementation as a vehicle of reflective learning at Stellenbosch University, The Contained Periodical of Educational activity and Learning, Vol. 12, No. two (2017)
[14] Greg Port, Why ePortfolios, All Saints' College (2020)
[15] Digital Portfolios: Guidelines for Beginners, Ian Munro, Ministry of Didactics, New Zealand (2011)
Amiria has been an Art & Design teacher and a Curriculum Co-ordinator for seven years, responsible for the course pattern and assessment of educatee work in two high-achieving Auckland schools. She has a Available of Architectural Studies, Available of Architecture (First Course Honours) and a Graduate Diploma of Teaching. Amiria is a CIE Accredited Art & Pattern Coursework Assessor.
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Source: https://www.studentartguide.com/articles/how-to-make-an-eportfolio-for-students
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