Abstract

Select freshman writing courses at St. John Fisher College are piloting the use of eportfolios in place of the traditional portfolios. The College has created templates that are designed so direct links between course work, goals, and student reflections are explicit. The intent of our study is to evaluate the differences in student’s reflective writing from a variety of freshman level writing courses, including both those using eportfolios and those using traditional paper portfolios. Using a rubric that evaluates student reflections on their understanding of purpose, significance, and relevancy, as well as the student’s overall performance, we will share the results on students' metacognitive abilities to connect course work with program goals, academic, and personal interests. The use of eportfolios at the College is specifically designed with a holistic view of the student. Our student eportfolios include academic, non-academic, personal and career components and are used by students both as a requirement within courses and programs, as well as on a voluntary basis. This framework is key to the implementation of eportfolios for us, as it requires students totake ownership of their learning, promotes evaluation of their own skill development, as well as learn to write for a broad audience. In the presentation we will discuss: · A brief history and philosophy of eportfolios on our campus · A demonstration of our template infrastructure, including the connection with our courses, programs and college-wide learning goals · Findings from our research study described above · Implications for all eportfolio users on the use of reflection within ePortfolios to increase metacognitive skills of students.