What chance for PLEs?

Hi, All,

I wonder if you can help me?

I have recently been awarded a Naace/Becta bursary in order to investigate the status of VLEs in UK schools. As such this is a simple and straightforward investigation of the facts as they appear in Primary and Secondary schools. (However any comments about your experiences of VLEs would be appreciated.)

One outcome of my work is already throwing up issues, relating to the concept of a PLE. I have some interesting ideas concerning PLEs that I need to share with like-minded souls who are concerned about the logical outcomes of the very confused present state of affairs. My summation is that, ‘Everyone does that which is right in their own eyes’.
Every VLE I have seen whether on the Becta list, non ‘approved’ suppliers or those self-designed by forward-looking schools, is different, offering different functionality and formats. Similarly, I have identified some 10 different versions of what an ePortfolio is supposed to be – with absolutely no chance of portability!

If there is ever going to be any commonality of format capable of ‘portability’ or ‘Interoperability’ it seems to me essential that the whole business of data-handling within a PLE must be clearly defined. The frustration is that far too many establishments have gone ahead without clear guidance spending much time, effort and money, and consequently will not want to undo their efforts. You can see more of my thinking on my website.

I am in the process of developing a model the first stages of which you can see in the two attachments herewith. Again, comments would be very much appreciated.

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Attachments:

ple-2.pdf, 1.8 MB
Data Processing within the PLE.rtf, 24 KB

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Permalink Reply by Hans Feldmeier on May 28, 2007 at 1:02pm

Hi Ray, you know I´m from Germany. I´ve got experience with several platforms: Dokeos from Belgium, Lo-net from Germany and Fronter from Norway. At the moment we are using Fronter - in our institution.
Fronter is not OS.
This platform has got some awards.

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Permalink Reply by pete whitfield on May 28, 2007 at 1:58pm

Hi Ray
I'm very interested to follow this, though my area is FE rather than primary or secondary. We started with Blackboard a few years ago and changed to Moodle at the start of this academic year. I am a Moodle fan - though I am aware it doesn't suit every need. I have watched the ePortfolio and PLE debate from the sidelines and from my experience I can see a strong argument for running with the global, open access Web 2.0 tools, though I imagine there is more of a need for a walled garden in primary and secondary. I'm trying to keep it simple! So, a student's eportfolio is splattered around the web, depending on which tool works best for the medium (video, audio, images, text, collaboration and community) and the student simply has a central linking point that goes out to these. This may be too simple for some academic requirements I imagine, but I feel it suits the learner.

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Permalink Reply by Ray Tolley on May 28, 2007 at 2:45pm

Thanks, Pete & Hans,

Yes, there are strong arguments both for and against OS but particularly in most schools (apart from the very large ones) we do not have the spare technician capacity to develop our own systems - they need to be bought in - often at considerable expense.

My vision is that the PLE is not just a cosmetic environment in which a student uses a variety of tools in order to research and eventually "splatter around the web" (I like it!) various artefacts. The PLE is provided by an institution for scholarly work, however collaborative it may be, and needs to be accessed and assessed regularly by teachers. Furthermore, I understand that the PLE itself should be portable, from one institution to the next, and 'maturing' as it progresses.

The problem, as I see it, is that mature adults can cope with the limitations of Moodle or any other OSS. However most children, I feel, need a more contained system, even if the more able pupils do add their own extras.

I think that the ePortfolio is intended to be a 'legal' document containing grades, teachers' comments, certifications etc. This ePortfolio can then be passed from Primary to Secondary, to FE or HE and to employers and on and on... It needs to be validated and secure.

In the UK we have a new 14-19 initiative where youngsters may operate in two institutions concurrently. Can students working in the two institutions access their same PLE, the same coursework etc? Will FE expect to see an ePortfolio passed on from the Secondary school?