Author: Linsey Duncan-Pitt, linsey.duncan-pitt@wlv.ac.uk

JISC e-Learning Activity Area: e-Portfolios

Higher Education Academy Subject Centre: Health Sciences and Practice

This case study illustrates...an effect on learning, an effect on student personal development, student satisfaction with e-learning, innovation in learning and teaching, staff personal development, a positive effect on recruitment, an influence on policy, use of resources, modifications to learning spaces, management of learning assets, an effect on social equality

Lessons Learned

Summary and Reflection

Embedding of technology into the curriculum relies on moving from early adoption to sustained engagement. The versatility of this tool has provided multiple points of engagement by both staff and students and a personalisation of the learning opportunities that were not offered by the VLE. The relative ease with which staff can construct web based learning materials has been an inducement to develop skills in the use of the system overall. Both staff and students have welcomed the opportunities for closer interaction via the collaborative tools and for many it suits their constructivist learning framework.

Taking this forward across the wider undergraduate healthcare student population will be a challenge in terms of providing training for both staff and students but in particular the student population. In other departments within the institution trainers have been employed to work with students to create large-scale use of the e-portfolio in a key skills/PDP module but there is no overall institutional coherence in approach and there are missed opportunities for central learning and teaching departments to learn from the experience of the innovators in the schools. In the School of Health a number of healthcare students do not come equipped with enough IT skills to feel confident to explore new technology and these students require more intensive support. Engaging staff in our healthcare economies will be the next focus for the work as without their involvement the e-portfolio will be an academic exercise lacking grounding in clinical practice.