Chapter 11 Journal

How can teachers and students use digital portfolios as tools for learning? A digital portfolio is a great tool for learning for both students and teachers. Teachers can use digital portfolios to offer an effective way to track their students progress and accomplishments. Teachers can also keep a digital portfolio of all their personal teachings and things like their resumes, experience, and references. Students also have a great advantage in using a digital portfolio because they can track their own work, be creative, have a little more self confidence when it comes to technology.

Tech Tool 11.1 Digital Portfolio Building Resources Tech Tools 11.1 is a great tech tool for many purposes especially for those students who want to become a teacher. I decided to explore these digital portfolio sites because in one of my classes this semester we are making a portfolio and I thought maybe it would be best to digitize mine. Furthermore, out of the three Digital portfolio sites the textbook offers I found the Taskstream most user friendly and have decided to begin digitizing my portfolio at the end of this semester. Digital portfolios may have their disadvantages but I believe they have more advantages then they do disadvantages.

Chapter 11 Summary Engaging Teachers and Students in Learning and Self-Reflection Chapter 11 gives great tips on how teachers and students can be proactive in tracking, evaluating, and assessing their own growth while using technology. It shows us how to evaluate ourselves and how to evaluate the growth of an educator. One of the most important tools in tracking growth is a Digital Portfolio. As I explained above a digital portfolio has many advantages and the advantages definitely out way the bad. Chapter 11 also provides tips on how to involve your students in learning and assessment. Also, it gives tip on how to provide online surveys for online preassessment and even provides a tech tool on how to build your own online resource with survey monkey, Zoomerang, and Poll Builder.

Educators also need to take into consideration that not all students are able to participate. This chapter does a great job on how to use student participation systems which are handheld wireless tools that offer interactive learning. For example, a clicker is a great handheld tool were students are able to participate with a handheld device based on questions provided by the educator and answered by the student. With the use of these tools, an educator can really change the experience in their classroom and are also able to evaluate and asses themselves based on feedback from the students.