How to Create an Online Portfolio with PBWiki

Here are the basic steps for using PBWiki to construct an interactive electronic portfolio.

1. Purpose. Decide on the purpose for the portfolio. What are you trying to show with this portfolio? Are there outcomes, goals, or standards that are being demonstrated with this portfolio? In this example, we will use an electronic portfolio to provide formative feedback on student work.

   - Identify how you are going to organize the portfolio. Will it be around the outcomes, goals or standards that you identified in this first step?

   - Set up a template for students, if appropriate. NOTE: Any page on this wiki tagged with 'template' will appear as a template when setting up a new page.

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2. Collection/Selection. What artifacts will you include in your portfolio?

   - Create a digital archive of work. Offline, this archive would be on a hard drive, flash drive, iPod or local area network server; online, these files can be stored anywhere on the Internet, as long as each document has a unique URL.

   - Use a simple table to list the artifacts, and assign (classify) each one to the outcome/goal/standard that the artifact will demonstrate. See Dr. Barrett's  portfolio for an example

   - Once these categories are identified, set up a page for each major category PLUS an Introduction page.

   - To create the navigation bar (on the upper right) click the SideBar tab, and create links to each page in the portfolio.

   - Add the artifacts (upload or through hyperlinks) to the appropriate pages in the portfolio.

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3. Reflection. Reflection is the heart and soul of a portfolio. Reflection provides the rationale for why these artifacts represent achievement of a particular outcome, goal or standard.

   - Write a brief reflection on each artifact (what is the context in which this artifact was developed? Why was it included in the portfolio?).

   - You might also write a reflection on each grouping of artifacts (by outcome/goal/standard).

   - The Introduction page should contain an overview of the portfolio. It serves as a "letter to the reader" and provides an explanation of the overall goals of the portfolio.

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4. Connection/Interaction/Dialogue. This stage provides an opportunity for interaction and feedback on the work posted in the portfolio. This is where the power of Web 2.0 interactive tools becomes apparent.

   - Select Share Your Wiki  [to invite others by email address be able to provide feedback]

   - Teachers and peers can use the feedback features of the software, such as "Edit this page" and comments in PBWiki, to provide feedback on the work posted in the ePortfolio.

   - Teachers often provide exemplars for different levels of achievement, and provides a rubric for evaluation.

   - The portfolio developer should be given the option of updating the work, based on the feedback and the rubric.

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5. Presentation/Publishing. The portfolio developer decides what parts of the portfolio are to be made public.

   - Select  Wiki Settings -> Backup [creates a copy downloaded to disk]

   - Select Portfolios (at the bottom of the screen) -  Create PDFs, slideshows, and more