The effect of process e-portfolios in supporting student reflection in a course on metalwork design

Chou Yung-ping, Huang Sifan and Yang Ming-ying
National United University
Miaoli, Taiwan

E-portfolios for students during the learning process (hereafter referred to as process portfolios) have been used widely in various disciplines in education, with facilitating reflection as the main purpose. Design education of whatever type (art, products, architecture etc.) has a long tradition of emphasizing student reflection because it is regarded as most effective for transforming experience into knowledge. In Taiwan, process portfolios are rarely used in design education, perhaps because the adoption of e-learning in this field is slower than in other disciplines. In this study, process portfolios are applied in a course on metalwork design, a face-to-face course in which students develop their design capabilities and drawing skills. The process portfolios include students’ drawings, personal and course discussion boards, demonstration videos, a reflective journal, group email communication and an access control mechanism. In the absence of an information system specially for e-portfolios, the teacher and students on the course were instructed to combine three popular services -- Flickr, Google Groups and YouTube -- to form a course portfolio and student portfolios respectively, which fits the above functions of process portfolios well. The effect of the portfolios on students’ reflective behaviour was studied using qualitative and quantitative approaches, the former analysing the students’ reflection reports with a coding hierarchy based on grounded theory, and the latter involving questionnaire surveys at the beginning and end of the course. It was found that the students came to recognize the importance of reflection in design practice, and their capability for reflection improved. Also, the qualitative analysis gave us a better understanding of how various functions in the e-portfolio system were used and why some of them were not useful.