1. 
Thinking Outside the Binder:
Online Portfolios
for Professional Review
John Barritt
Academic English Studies
Lewis & Clark College

2. Online Portfolios
 Process = professional development
 Cultivate technological literacy
 Exposure to new tools for classroom

3. Getting Started
 Identify / bridge gaps in tech literacy
 Adopt a pedagogical stance that targets
“multiliteracies”

4. Multiliteracies
 The New London Group (1996)
 Literacy includes “negotiating a multiplicity of
discourses.”
 Take into account “culturally and linguistically
diverse and increasingly globalized societies.”
 “[T]he proliferation of communications
channels and media supports and extends
cultural and subcultural diversity.”

5. Future of EAP
 Preparing learners for participation in global
discourse communities
 Peer networks
 “Cultural and subcultural diversity”
 Alternatives to western-centered research
discourse (e.g. journals)

6. Documentation
 Blogs
 Videos
 Podcasts
 VoiceThreads
 Discussion Forums
 Moodle Pages
 PowerPoints
 Images
 PDFs

7. Tagging
 Non-linear organization
 Facilitates sharing across global peer networks
 Indicate interrelationships
 An added layer of meaning

8. StudentWork
 Public
 Portable
 Private (password protected)
 Connected

9. Advantages Over Binders
 Preservation of artifacts in a digital format
 Portability
 Accessibility

10. Multiple Intelligences
 Support your own learning preference
 Photos / videos of classroom activities and field
trips
 Video commentary
 Audio commentary
 Mindmapping (lesson design)
 Workshop presentations

11. Promotional Materials
 Accessible
 Showcasing use of Web 2.0 tools in classroom
 Increase visibility of program

12. Remembrances ofThings Past
 The changing face of the technological landscape
 The case of Ning

13. Archiving Artifacts
 Jing
 Screenshots
 PDFs

14. Social Media = New Opportunities
 To engage students linguistically
 To receive input / produce output
 Situate language learning in contexts that are socially
meaningful to them

15. Portfolio 2.0
 Opportunities to master Web 2.0 tools
 “Communicative competence” for the digital age
 Wash over to paper-based colleagues
 Exposure to new tools for enhancing & extending
the classroom experience
 “Hybrid” courses, “blended” learning

16. References
 McKay, S. (2002). Teaching English as an international language:
Rethinking goals and approaches. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
 The New London Group. (1996). A pedagogy of multiliteracies:
Designing social futures. Harvard Educational Review. 66(1).
Retrieved from
http://wwwstatic.kern.org/filer/blogWrite44ManilaWebsite/paul/artic
 Stevens, V. (2005). Multiliteracies for Collaborative Learning
Environments. TESL-EJ. 9(2).
 Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre analysis: English in academic and
research settings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.