Commonly accepted reasons for the usage of web-based e-portfolios are among others:

• growing interest for new media
• online-portfolios are accessible at anytime and anywhere as long as a broadband connection exists
• online portfolios are secure when access is limited by passwords
• paper-based portfolios grow over a period and get unmanageable
• web-based systems are maintained by some system provider not by the user, therefore requirements for the user’s working environment are minimal (a browser is usually sufficient).

In the following blog entries, some web-based systems with e-portfolio functionality will be briefly presented:

• ePortfolio Hessen
• InteLeC – Integrated eLearning Campus
• RPI-virtuell
• CLIX

The Leipziger Lernportfolio is a web-based e-portfolio solution for language learning. Against the background of a rising demand for self-responsibility and self-regulation of a learner’s learning processes the Leipziger Lernportfolio goes beyond ELP and focuses on supporting meta-cognition as well as on fostering autonomous learning [Baerenfaenger-Ionica-2006]. Both objectives are achieved by using e-portfolios fulfilling a process-oriented pedagogical function [kohonen-2000].

The selected pedagogical model for learning processes basis on hybrid processes [sands-2002, masie-2002, oliver-trigwell-2005]. As these include a content, a space, a time and an individual dimension, they resemble processes in project management [Baerenfaenger-2005]. Hence, the implementors decided to design the Leipziger Lernportfolio by phasing a learning process according to project management methods. The expected results were a stronger goal orientation, a more precise ability to plan, a higher transparency, and a much better success control.

References
Olaf Bärenfänger. Learning Management: A new Approach to Structuring Hybrid Learning Arrangements. Electronical Journal of Foreign Language Teaching, 2(2):14–35, 2005. Available here.

Olaf Bärenfänger and Lavinia Ionica. Fremdsprachenlernen mit Unterstützung elektronischer Portfolios: Probleme, Ziele und Perspektiven. Zeitschrift für Interkulturellen Fremdsprachenunterricht, 11(2), 2006. Also available here.

Viljio Kohonen. Exploring the educational possibilities of the �Dossier�: some suggestions for developing the pedagigic function of the European Language Portfolio, 2000. Also available here.

Elliott Masie. Blended learning. the magic in the mix. In Allison Rossett, editor, The ASTD e-learning Handbook, pages 58–64. McGraw-Hill, New York, US, 2002.

Martin Oliver and Keith Trigwell. Can’t blended learning be redeemed? ELearning, 2(1):17–26, 2005.

Peter Sands. Inside outside, upside down. strategies for connecting online and face-to-face instruction in hybrid courses. Teaching with Technology Today, 8(6), 2002. Also available here.

This European project has been carried out with the support of the European Community within the framework of the Minerva Programme. Its goal was to implement a European Language Portfolio (ELP) in a digital format, useful for learners of foreign languages [Schneider-Lenz-elp-guide, trim-1997-elp, Europarat-2004]. The Council of Europe has stated that language teaching and learning are key elements towards European integration and mobility. The ELP is an initiative of the Council of Europe to support life-long language learning as a way of responding to economic, social, and cultural changes in Europe. Its functions are twofold: a reporting and a pedagogical function. It exists in different versions in various countries and languages, but all the ELPs have the same structure and pursue the same objectives so that every ELP is an international comparable document that underlines an individual’s linguistic experiences and certifications. It comprises a passport, a bibliography, and a dossier per language .

The language passport is maintained by the e-portfolio owner regularly. He is provided with a grid and several questionnaires to document language competencies according to commonly accepted European-wide criteria. The bibliography helps the owner to describe his experiences in in each language (by a questionnaire). The goal here is to guide the owner in planning and assessing progress. Finally,the dossier is a is an instrument which helps the student to maintain assets (e.g. certificates) of personal work that illustrate and justify the owner’s language competencies.

From a pedagogical point of view, the developers concentrated on the following key issues:

• Student’ss self-awareness development
• Self-assessment tools and learner’s autonomy
• Transparency of the recursiveness of the learning process
• Multimedia evidence of language learning
• Avoiding information overload of paper ELPs

The developed software bases on research in ELP and it is a cross-platform desktop-based Java application. The information of the digital ELP is stored in a proprietary XML data structure that keeps trace of student’s modifications over time. For data representation in a user-friendly graphic way the PDF document format is used to show the evolution of the language learning process. The German partner in this project was Ingrid Boettcher de Lange from the European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder) and helped to develop some parts of the software and made the translation of the whole program. The two-year project started in November 2003 and finished in November 2005. An extension of the project is not planned. The e-ELP is a not validated model (by the EU Validation Committee), although the project partners applied for it twice. The modifications that the Committee requires are of high impact on the model such that changes of the model are likely. This is one key reason why an extension of the project is not pursued.

References
Günther Schneider and Peter Lenz. A Guide for Developers of European Language Portfolios. Technical report, Strasbourg: Council of Europe, 2001. Also available here.

John Trim. The European Language Portfolio. In Council of Europe, editor, A European Language Portfolio: some questions relating to its nature, function, form, preparation and distribution, pages 3–12, 1997.

Europarat. European Language Portfolio. Principles and guidelines (33. rev), 2004. Also available here.

The commercial CLIX learning management system by IMC AG CLIX is a web-based content management system which enables to keep track of learning and knowledge processes via a browser. CLIX is a scalable, multilingual software product. It comes along with standard interfaces to HR and ERP systems and can easily be adapted to individual customer needs. CLIX meets the requirements of companies, universities, and schools.

Since version 6.1, CLIX puts more emphasis on social software and e-portfolio functionalities. Among others, it will provide Wikis, Blogs, and interfaces to Skype and ICQ for messaging as well as an interface to an own internal messaging system. From e-portfolio point of view, it implements certification management, grade books, and skill management taking the validity time into account.

According to IMC AG, CLIX is applied at several German universities, among others, at: the TU Munich, the TU Darmstadt, the RWTH Aachen and the Saarland University.

rpi-virtuell is a web-based learning environment originally developed for religious education in the Internet. It is initiated by the evangelic church in Germany. The environment is open for any discipline and can be used by any institution. It provides a set a set eTools. Some tools are template-based (notes, calender, evaluations, etc.), others are folder-based via an online-editor (topic folder, e-Xpedition folder, portfolio folder, etc.). Students have an account and can enter different seminar lectures by subscription.

The platform bases on ASP, PHP, and an MS SQL database.

The InteLeC (Integrated eLearning Campus) project is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research with a total of 2 Mio. EUR and runs from 01.05.2005 until 30.04.2008. InteLeC is part of the national program “new media in education”. The project specializes on the development of a new campus-wide conceptual and technical infrastructure supporting the further dissemination and a wide-spread use of eLearning and thus serving as an enabling platform for the University of Passau.

The e-portfolio part in this project comprises three major functions: a portfolio for collection, a learning diary for reflection, and a registration book for planning. Any information is secured by a multilevel permission framework which is controlled by the owner of the portfolio.

The portfolio function supports the collection and internal presentation of e-portfolio
items and envisions sharing of assets.

The learning diary serves for changing the profile, for keeping a diary in form of a blog or a web page, and for collaboration with fellow students and teachers. The registration book facilitates maintaining information related to the studied subject: finding information about the field of study or about the current term, receiving a list of appropriate lectures, getting a view on passed or failed exams including missing results. Moreover, the system will be able to recommend lectures to support the general term planning, and to synchronise with the succeeding term.

The first realization of the e-portfolio will be done in teacher education.

The school development project ePortfolio Hessen is a project in Germany for testing e-portfolios in school lessons. The test lessons started with the beginning of the school year 2006/2007 in several selected schools in Hesse (currently six schools). Teachers were prepared in training courses which were conducted by the Institute of Education (Department of School education) of the Jusus-Liebig-University Giessen.

The lessons were individualised. Students were supposed to learn how to reflect and present their skills and competencies. The constructive and productive ability by using new media (e.g. Weblog, Social Software) was also part of the teaching. One goal of this project was to build and invigorate these competencies in secondary school by using an e-portfolio.

E-portfolios will be evaluated to find out more about the students’ individualised, differentiated, and self-reflected learning.

The e-portfolio software runs on the official Hessian education server where the individual assets are stored.

So far, a ready-to-download and ready-to-use software developed in Germany and tailored for e-portfolio application could not be spotted, neither in the commercial, academic nor open source sector. Also, there are no signs for ongoing developments of such e-portfolio software. A kind of exception is the Portfolio:Medienkompetenz.

Portfolio:Medienkompetenz

The promotion of developing media competencies at school is gaining more importance since the middle of the 90s. In this context, in North Rhine-Westphalia, the federal state institute for school has developed a paper-based portfolio framework called Portfolio:Medienkompetenz in cooperation with the Bertelsmann Stiftung. This instrument helps students to identify and document their individual media competencies acquired at school or in a non-school related context [Hauf-Tulodziecki-2005].

The portfolio is distributed at several schools in different German federal states. For instance, in 2002/2003, about 200 schools in Lower Saxony used the media portfolio beginning with 7th grade students. To date, the media portfolio is also used at different schools in Bremen and North Rhine-Westphalia. Interested schools can download from the Internet.

This portfolio supports typical actions such as the collection of individual assets, the documentation of the work and learning progress, and reflection on the learning process. The student provides input by filling out a set of questionnaires and template forms. Both input methods are explained by short descriptions.

Requirements for the use of the media portfolios are the provision of media content at schools, the integration of portfolio work into the curriculum, pedagogical guidance, and the provision of time for maintaining such a portfolio.

In addition to the paper-based portfolio, the Portfolio Assistant, an electronic desktop version was developed that allows to store recurrent information and to generate nice print-outs.

References:
Annemarie Hauf-Tulodziecki. Die Portfoliomethode: Evaluation von Lernerfahrungen für Schülerinnen und Lehrerinnen. In Veronika Hornung-Prähauser, editor, Tagungsbeitrag zum ePortfolio Forum, pages 39–42, Apr 2005.

Research on e-portfolios in Germany is rather less prevalent. Only a few projects and initiatives exist which we will name in the following.

To get a first impression of the German e-portfolio community activity frequency, Google can provide us with two data types: page hits and queries. For both, we used the input string “eportfolio, e-portfolio”.

Google page hits for “eportfolio, e-portfolio� (March 2007)

The previous figure shows the distribution of page hits ordered by country (done with Google Language Tools). For Germany, the amount of page hits in March 2007 is about 118000 which is a very high value. That is, so many web pages were counted which include either the term “eportfolio” or “e-portfolio”. Compared to other European countries, Germany ranks at second position, right after United Kingdom with c. 140000 page hits. The international leader are the United States where, in fact, the research activities in this domain are very intensive. For China, Google counts 402 page hits. This statistic puts forward that there is intensive activity in the e-portfolio domain.

However, the query analysis (done with Google Trend) shows a different behaviour (see Figure below). Although, the high number of queries asked in United Kingdom still correlates with a high number of page hits, there is a steep drop for Germany. This proposes that there is little interest in e-portfolios. Taking both statistics into account, the conclusion is that only a few interested parties work intensively on e-portfolios and it also raises the question on the communities vividness and sustainability.

Queries for “eportfolio, e-portfolio� (March 2007)

Queries for “eportfolio, e-portfolio� by region (March 2007)

Further statistical investigation is needed that sheds light on the quality of page hits: who is the author, what is his background, who is the target group, what kind of page is it (article, blog), are the hits (imported) blogs, is it a general, pedagogical, or a technical page. Also, it is worth to know who the query requesters are and in what kind of e-portfolios are they interested.

From interviews we know, that a collaborative, vivid, and sustainable community does not exist in Germany, yet. Though, there are several working groups developing proprietary e-portfolios solutions or using e-portfolios at schools and universities in pilot studies, most of the groups and e-portfolio researchers do not know each other. Also, these groups usually do not have contacts to the international English speaking e-portfolio community. Consequently, they are not aware of international work, achievements, and standards such as IMS e-portfolio.

A more general problem is the lack of accessibility to e-portfolio software or systems for personal evaluation. To our knowledge, there exist so far only two open source web-based solutions, namely Elgg and Open Source Portfolio. There is no German alternative. Likewise, there is no rich client solution ready to download, install and test. Hence, there are only limited ways to get an impression what an e-portfolio is.

To boost the e-portfolio community movement and activities, we recommend:

• a national e-portfolio workshop to primarily bring together e-portfolio researchers, developers, users, and other interested parties. The workshop should inform about e-portfolio work and current state.
• a national e-portfolio community platform acting as an entry point for e-portfolio researchers, developers, users, and other interested parties to inform about current e-portfolio work and status.
• a German e-portfolio open source solution is needed to show interested parties what an e-portfolio could look like and what functions it can provide.

The e-portfolio community in Germany is not as visible, vivid, and sustainable as it is for instance in United Kingdom or Austria. There is no policy support by public authorities at the federal or regional level. Activities are limited to local research, to development of proprietary e-portfolio solutions, and to pilot studies. In the context of this investigation, the identification of e-portfolio activities as well as of e-portfolio researchers, developers, and users turned out to be a successful achievement.

Because the community is not in high gear, no e-portfolio portal or community platform has been set up. Some researchers maintain a (private) weblog or contribute to an online platform run by their department. Despite of this fact, there exists a German-speaking community Portfolio-Schule (Germany, Austria, and Suisse) of pedagogy researches and teachers who investigate the application of paper-based portfolios at school.

Concerning e-portfolio solutions, web-based systems — partially LMS with some e-portfolio functions — are the predominant choice. None of the systems provides import/export facilities for IMS e-portfolio encoded data which reflects the lack of relations to the international community. Also, there is neither any open source nor any ready-to-download-and-test solution on the market.

E-portfolios are not anchored in any school curriculum. Therefore, if they are used then only in form of a class education accompanying tool. Pilot studies are being conducted occasionally at German schools. The most prominent study is eportfolio-hessen. There exists only one higher education curriculum, the Master of Distance Education Program (MDE) in Oldenburg, which requires the use of e-portfolios to finish the grade successfully.

Other e-portfolio related activities deal with personal development planning and competency/skill management (e.g., Talent Relationship Management (SAP), KOWIEN, Professional-learning).

A feasibility study identified 200 PDP initiatives and 50 PDP passports which are merely locally used. Based on the study’s results, a global framework has been devised. It’s implementation, the ProfilPass, is currently being disseminated all over Germany and it is considered an instrument that completes EuroPass.

A constant key problem in Germany is data protection that has a strong visibility in the public and in the media. It is a key obstacle for tracking employee data. So far, there is no explicit employee data protection law. However, the protection of individual-related data is considered a base right. The key data protection principles are: data prevention and data economy, necessity, and earmarking. Whenever an employer wants to track individual-related data he has to inform his employees, to ask them for permission, and to show that his intentions are justified and that they do not violate his employees’ right on informational self-determination. Against the background of this complex issue, companies rather prioritise the implementation of e-portfolios low.

Eventually, we can summarise that Germany has a relatively low but growing degree of awareness of e-portfolios.