Using ePortfolio to Showcase ESOL Student Projects

Submitted by: Ellen Quish (Adult Learning Center)

Course: Advanced ESOL (ALC409)
Themes: Reflection, Social pedagogies, First-year & basic skills

[PDF version]

Context & Reflection

This lesson was used to give higher-intermediate to advanced level ESOL students a range of content-rich opportunities to strengthen their English language proficiency as well as their meta-cognitive and technology skills. Over a span of two weeks, students in this class collaborated to write and record a short story based on a painting in the Modern, European, or American collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  The audio files, along with images of the paintings, were uploaded to students’ ePortfolios. Students were then asked to listen to the recorded stories of other groups and, using the commenting feature, provide feedback.  Once stories were shared, students responded to a reflective prompt about the project and uploaded the reflection with the assignment.

This assignment was effective in addressing and realizing curricular goals.  The multimedia capacity of ePortfolio captured the images, text, and sound of student projects and offered students the opportunity to practice their English language listening and speaking skills. Moreover, this capacity allowed students to share and respond to each other's stories. Students responded with a great deal of enthusiasm and clearly enjoyed taking their work outside of the classroom as well as producing a collaborative assignment.

Lesson Objectives

1. Students will improve their English skills while writing, listening and talking about art.
2. Students will work collaboratively to utilize what they know about the genre of short stories.
3. Students will gain practice in looking at and interpreting art.
4. Students will become familiar with the Modern, American, and European collections at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Steps Involved

1. In assigned groups, students search the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s online Modern, American, and European collections (www.metmuseum.org) and choose two paintings as possible inspiration for a short story. In selecting the paintings, students need to consider the five elements of a short story (i.e., setting, conflict, plot, character and theme).
2. At the Metropolitan Museum, student groups find the two paintings they selected and decide which painting they will write a short story about.
3. Keeping in mind the five elements of a short story, students collaborate to write a draft of their short story.
4. Student groups submit Draft #1 of short stories to teacher for feedback.
5. Students revise their short stories and upload them to the Classes and Projects page of their ePortfolios with an image of the painting that inspired the story.
6. Students use Audacity to record their short stories and upload them to the Classes and Projects page of their ePortfolios.
7. Students listen to at least two of the recorded short stories uploaded by other groups in the class and, using the commenting feature, identify the setting, characters, plot of the stories as well as leave feedback on the stories.
8. Students write and upload to their ePortfolios a short reflective introduction to the Student Masterpieces project assignment that includes a brief description of the project steps, the skills that were practiced and an explanation of its level of difficulty/ease.

Student Reflections

The reflective process was scaffolded by first requiring students to give feedback on peer projects and then asking them to reflect on their own learning. Students were provided with structured reflective prompts to clarify what they were being asked to do.

Feedback & Evaluation

Students received feedback from their peers and from the instructor. There are no grades given in this non-credit course. The assignment "products," i.e., the short story in its written and recorded forms, helped demonstrate what students had learned.