E-sketchbooks and eportfolios

	Task Create electronic sketchbooks and eportfolios to manage, record and present work made with digital media.
	Rationale E-sketchbooks and eportfolios are the most effective means of recording process and outcomes when pupils use digital media. They simplify formative and summative assessment of computer-based work, and promote good practice by encouraging pupils to save digital work at each stage of its development. They could be used to create or support a continuum between key stages for learners, in the transition between primary and secondary phases, from school through into post-16 education, and towards a record of lifelong learning . Electronic sketchbooks and portfolios are also an introduction to vocational practice, as professional artists, craftspeople and designers increasingly showcase their best work in e-portfolios on the web or on DVD. While eportfolios are broader in content and purpose, possibly presenting a selection of best work, e-sketchbooks might document process, experimentation, personal responses and reflections, research and teacher comments alongside final outcomes for a single given project. They could also work in parallel with traditional sketchbooks if printouts of digital work are developed in other media, digitized again, further manipulated and so on in a creative cyclical relationship between media (see the project on Mixed Media Collage for an example of this). Follow the link below to read an informative paper by George Siemens on how eportfolios reflect the changing nature of learning and the changing needs of learners. He discusses the reasons for their increase, their benefits for institutions and potential uses, range of content, the process of creating one, available tools, trends, and implementing an institutional approach, concluding by emphasising the need for the learner to be in control. In assessing the limited range of dedicated tools that are currently available, he considers that ePortfolios are "in their infancy", but suggests that "any tool that allows an individual to design and publish digital content could be used ...", including HTML editors and blogs. http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/eportfolios.htm Other information In Wales an eportfolio for every citizen was launched in November 2004: www.careerswales.com In its report "Harnessing Technology: Transforming Learning and Children's Services", the DfES e-strategy envisages a personal online learning space for every learner "that can encompass a personal portfolio": http://www.dfes.gov.uk/publications/e-strategy/ A presentation, summary and transcript of Bernie Zakary's talk on eportfolios given during Becta's December 2004 Expert Technologies seminar on e-Assessment is available at: http://www.becta.org.uk/etseminars/presentations/index.cfm?seminar_id=37&id=2608 DiDA - The Graphics module of Edexcel's new Diploma in Digital Arts is presented for assessment and moderation in an eportfolio. The Diploma is a paperless suite of three qualifications that allow progression from the Award (AIDA), to the Certificate (CiDA), through to the full Diploma (DiDA), which is worth four GCSEs. The Graphics module contributes to either the Certificate or Diploma qualifications. It's a great opportunity for collaboration between the ICT and Art departments, as well as for e-confident art and design students to develop creativity in new media and to gain accreditation for their skills through projects that focus on realistic digital design briefs. For more information and to see the current briefs and Standardisation exemplar materials visit the dedicated Edexcel website: http://dida.edexcel.org.uk/home/ John Pallister, head of ICT at Wolsingham School and Community College in County Durham, has developed an e-portfolio that he is using with his Year 7 and 12 students, called the 'e-me', a video-rich multimedia presentation. Visit their dedicated website to find out more: http://www.e-me.org.uk/
	Process
	Since digital imaging or video work-in-progress may have large file sizes until the finished piece can be optimized and compressed, ask your network manager or technician to advise you on the best method of organising and saving e-sketchbook or eportfolio folders to an accessible drive on the network. Art teachers should also be able to access the drive and pupil folders. At the end of the project folders can be emptied and e-sketchbooks archived to CD-ROM or DVD, but while work is ongoing they will require space on the school system, although they could also be backed up regularly on USB pens (if these are available for pupils).
	Create a new folder for each pupil and name it with his/her initials and class e.g. RKM9B_esketch or RKM9B_eportfolio.
	Show pupils how to browse to this folder and explain that they must save all their digital work during the project to it. You should also remind them that when they have made significant alterations to an image or other digital work, they should not simply click on Save, which would overwrite the old version with a new one, but select Save As and give the changed image a version number e.g. self_portrait_scream1, self_portrait_scream2 etc, so that each transformation is recorded.
	Before constructing the final eportfolio pupils should review the contents of their e-sketchbook or eportfolio folder and create pages to lay out their work in a format that allows it to be shared more easily. Use skills that pupils have already gained through their ICT lessons, so choose a program with which they are familiar and which is already available on the school network. The simplest alternative would be to insert the images and type text explanations or annotations into a word processing document, like Word or Appleworks. A page layout package such as Publisher, Serif PagePlus, QuarkXpress, or Adobe InDesign could be used. So could presentation software like PowerPoint or AppleWorks. Presentations or documents could be saved in a universally accessible format as PDF files Another option is to use your image-editing software to create A4 size image files onto which pictures and text can be added - see the tutorial on how to do this using Photoshop. Alternatively, web-authoring programs such as Macromedia Dreamweaver, Serif WebPlus or Microsoft FrontPage could be used to lay out the e-sketchbooks or eportfolios as web pages.
	At the end of the project the folders can be cleared for new work after the e-sketchbooks have been saved to DVDs or CD-ROMs as part of a departmental archive, which can be used to introduce future modules. Pupils should have a copy for their individual record of work or lifelong eportfolios. It may also be useful for pupils to scan selected pages of traditional sketchbooks and process books that they develop during the project to their digital folder for a fuller record of the interaction between digital and conventional modes of developing ideas and artwork.
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	Example pages
	This page was laid out in Microsoft Word. The notes were added in a Text Box and the numbers and pictures were centred in a table with no border, 4 columns and 4 rows.


		These are the first three slides of an e-sketchbook presented in PowerPoint. The wrapping paper designs were created using Serif DrawPlus, a vector drawing package.



		The pages of this undergraduate student's e-process book for his Transport Design course have been laid out in Photoshop. See the tutorial for help with how to do this.
		Designs - © Daniel Kafka 2003

		This eportfolio was created in Serif WebPlus, a web-authoring program. The site plan diagram was made using MindGenius concept mapping software. A step-by-step tutorial about making an eportfolio and project resources for DiDA Unit 3 Graphics is available as a free CDROM, or to download from the Serif education site: http://www.serif.com/dida



		Web links
		Blogging and online eportfolios My Space http://www.myspace.com Your pupils are already probably creating online eportfolios through free online community spaces such as this, although they may not think of them as anything so educational. Anyone can create a private community on MySpace to share photos, journals and interests with a network of friends by creating a profile, uploading pictures, making a blog or journal and inviting friends to join your personal network Finally, you can view the connections you make between your friends and their friends to widen the network further. Traditional paper sketchbooks Drumcroon http://www.drumcroon.org.uk/Sketchbooks/sketch.html Drumcroon is Wigan's Centre for Art Education. The section on sketchbooks is a motivating and comprehensive introduction to the potential, range of practice, different formats and the value of keeping a sketchbook for pupils. University of Florida http://www.arts.ufl.edu/art/rt_room/sketchbk/sketching.html One of the links from Drumcroon is to the pages on the University of Florida's art education website that look at how to get started keeping a sketchbook with examples of artists' books and instructions on how to make your own. Dan Eldon http://www.daneldon.org/ Particularly engaging is the site of a young Californian photojournalist and war correspondent, Dan Eldon, who was killed in Mogadishu in 1993. From the age of 15 he kept notebooks. These are reproduced on his website as interactive facsimile pages and will give students another fascinating introduction to keeping a personal journal or sketchbook. Tracey http://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/ac/tracey/sketchbook.html Tracey is the Contemporary Drawing Research website of Loughborough University School of Art and Design, which promotes drawing as a way of collecting information, working out ideas or solving problems and 'as a form of "visual thinking"'. The site has an online collection of sketchbooks and visual notebooks that will stimulate and inspire pupils, students and other artists alike. There is also an interesting gallery of 'found drawings' (which they define as possible 'by-products of other processes, organic forms or discarded materials - images arising by accident rather than from any conscious process.') that range from vapour trails to stains on a pavement and cake crumbs. Contributions are invited.
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© RKM 2002 - 2007