Reflections on a Pedagogical Chrysalis

Factors that Framed the Creation of Version 1.0 Honors course Desire to help students engage in more metacognition Desire to help students integrate their learning processes Desire for students to have a better understanding of how they achieved course goals Clearer connections between the learning in the course and Lane’s Core Learning Outcomes (CLOs)

Successes of Version 1.0 Clarified the importance of the ePortfolio requirement in the Honors program Engaged students with Lane’s Core Learning Outcomes (CLOs) Provided students with a space to compile artifacts that demonstrated/represented their learning process Helped students recognize, develop, and begin to reflect upon how their academic and co- curricular experiences interconnect Provided a space where students could grapple with melding the personal and academic/professional

Integrating Lane’s CLOs

“It's Dakota. I decided to you because I, surprise surprise, got a new tattoo. You were a part of the process of me accepting and understanding my tattoos and myself in a professional and academic sense; I thought I would show you and say thank you for being a part of that important process. I figured this tattoo signified acceptance, respect, and professionalism, with or without tattoos. I love it, and you can bet you'll see it on my ePortfolio! ”

My ePortfolio Pedagogy Road Test

Areas in Need of Improvement in Version 1.0 Pedagogical integration of ePortfolio Clarity of ePortfolio purpose Clarity of ePortfolio audience Setting clearer expectations for reflection elements (aka moving students away from the “filing cabinet” mentality for posting course work)

Tj Dakota Doug

Goals of my Co-Creators for the 2.0 Revision More deeply integrate ePortfolios into instruction/pedagogy Focus more on reflection and metacognition and provide clearer expectations for reflection Craft clearer connections between assignments within the course Streamline student workload

Revised assignments to foster deeper connections between them Revised the way ePortfolios were used in the course in order to more deeply embed them in the pedagogy of the course and to help streamline student work Weighted ePortfolio more heavily in overall assessment of the course (from 25% in Version 1.0 to nearly 40% in Version 2.0) Composed detailed reflection questions for each stage of the course as well as more detailed instructions for the final Course Goal Reflection

Essay 1.0 Reflection Questions Version 2.0 For this reflection, you want to engage and reflect upon the following questions: Why did you to choose the specific person/event you’re focusing on in this course? What was your research process like? What were some of the successes, failures, joys, and/or frustrations on this process? What did you learn about your person/event in your research? (You might want to focus on one or two really interesting discoveries here.) How did you decide what your thesis would be? What led you to the conclusion that that was the most significant contribution of this person/event to Black American history? Which course goals do you think you most directly worked toward meeting while doing the research/writing/revisions for Essay 1.0? What things did you learn about yourself, your writing, or your research process during the process of Essay 1.0 that you think might be helpful to you in future projects in this course and/or in your other courses?

“I learned a lot about myself as a writer in this process. For one thing, I realized that I am bad at critiquing my own work. I know that in the future I will search for more peer review and get as much feedback as possible. I also learned that my research process needs a little practice, especially when working with a lot of intensive information. I think I’ll need a yellow legal pad for the next essay I write about bell hooks. I feel like I have developed my skills at academic arguing with this assignment, but because it was the first to frame argument as something other than war, I am looking forward to more practice at using the right language to lay out evidence that makes sense to my audience, not just to me. I’m proud of myself for how far I feel like I’ve progressed in this sense, and I think that thinking of this work as something that will be read by more people than my Writing 122 instructor really helped with that. This project has made me really excited about academic research, and I’m really looking forward to applying my new skills and understanding to the next assignment in this class and beyond.” -Molly (Version 2.0)

“This ePortfolio has allowed me the opportunity to have a place where I can share my work and my new knowledge. Having an ePortfolio is something that I feel is necessary, given the aspirations I have. It has been a pleasure to see it slowly take form. I am immensely proud of how far it, and I, have come.” --Brandi “Goal number 10 was Create an ePortfolio which demonstrates your ability to think reflectively and critically about your own learning process. I’ve met this goal by meeting all of the course goals and reflecting on them in this ePortfolio. I have been working on understanding these course goals through out the whole term. I have put all my effort into developing essays that I am proud of and that are something to be proud of because they reflect the course effectively. Now, I have an ePortfolio that reflects all that I have learned, and all the goals that I have met.” --Alexandra

“I believe that this ePortfolio has been a great place to document my progress in this class, and to hold all of my metacognitive processes near where they matter most, the work that they reflect upon. I have never endeavored to put my metacognitive processes on paper before, and although I think very deeply about many subjects, I rarely share these thoughts with people. I am not yet able to express my deepest thoughts, the true representations of my inner, thoughtful self, into words. I hope to develop the skill to do so as I progress through ever more challenging environments in academia which ask me to think deeply and document these thought processes.” Luke

“Through this ePortfolio I was able to think reflectively and critically about my own learning process. What helped me most about creating in this aspect was writing reflections on my ePortfolio for each essay written. Often while writing the reflections, I would find myself admitting things about my writing and learning process that I had not even considered prior to writing these reflections. For example, I struggled a lot when it came to in depth revision of drafts at the beginning of the term, and while I was writing my reflection on essay 2.0 I really started to accept that revision is my ally.” Mary

“The last major part of this class was the creation of the e-portfolio. The process of putting a small section of my life into a digital page was daunting and time consuming. I really struggled when deciding what to put on my e-portfolio. I’m an intensely private person and some of the things I have up here are revealing and that makes me naturally uncomfortable. In a way I didn’t want to be too personal, so I tried to just polish everything up the best I could but I also feel like that made it seem so cold and mechanic. So I decided to add pages about myself and add another course to the list so that I could expand on the work I was doing and give everything as much context as possible for why I’m going to LCC in the first place, and where I’m trying to head.” Rosella