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Kolb’s Learning CycleKolb’s Learning Cycle

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Kolb’s Learning Cycle

° Future practice

° planning for further learning and development

° analysing experiences and learning moments

° relating theory and practice

° meta-learning

° Workplace learning

° internships

° virtual placements

° clinical placements

° informal learning

° volunteer projects

° formal learning

° Reviewing and reflecting on experiences

° recognising learning moments

° identifying significant aspects of practice

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• supports pedagogies across places and spaces • travels with the learner to future learning places and spaces• promotes ‘real world’ assessment• supports pedagogic innovation• centres the student in evidencing unit/course learning outcomes

Assessment citeria: Students need a clear understanding of the purpose for compiling a professional ePortfolio. The CRA rubric is one means of clarifying expectations. Criteria underpinning current ePortfolio assessments at QUT suggest the degree to which students should:• identify, describe and analyse critical incidents• relate the incident to their own skills, professional experience, and discipline knowledge• detail significant factors underlying the incident/issue• reframe or reconstruct future practice or professional understanding• evidence their awareness of the depth and breadth of the profession/industry

Place and spaces — ePortfolio in the curriculumMaster of Information Technology (Library and Information Studies) students undertake a course-long Professional Practice unit developing their professional ePortfolios as the major assessment in the unit. Students develop critical reflections and gather artefacts to evidence learning from a range of spaces and places such as prior experiences, work placements, mentorships as well as formal unit-based learning and professional industry events. Students are supported by the ALIA professional standards, the basis for job seeking and ongoing professional development.

Bachelor and Master of Social Work — students use the QUT Student ePortfolio to undertake assessment components across their courses. These tasks challenge students to understand their profession and to recognise both their formal learning and informal and work-based learning as they develop the skills and abilities to meet the Australian Social Work (AASW) practice standards, and to show how they have met the unit/course learning objectives. In this way, the unit and course coordinators can clearly see student achievement.

Bachelor of Laws — 3rd year Virtual work placement unit. The QUT Student ePortfolio has enabled innovation in assessment. Students evidence their learning through ePortfolio development. The CRA rubric for grading has developed over a number of years to best support students’ understanding of the assessment requirements. The task recognises the diverse ways in which learning objectives may be evidenced. This has informed the revision of unit learning objectives to explicate both generic and discipline-specific skills.

Nurse Practitioner students are experienced nurses returning to off-campus postgraduate study to formalise their experience. At QUT, the course coordinator has reinvigorated existing assessment through ePortfolio. Students compile a professional ePortfolio of critical reflections and supporting artefacts, drawn from prior experience, clinical practice and the ‘classroom’, to show how they meet the ANMC Nurse Practitioner Competencies. Lecturers have seen enhanced reflective capacity and meta-learning in students undertaking this type of assessment.

Bachelor of Information Technology — students undertake core foundational studies in the first semester where they reflect on curriculum activities progressively over the semester. The ePortfolio underpins three assessment activities that challenge students to make connections between their existing skills, their understanding and expectations of working in the IT industry and the discipline topics covered; to explore the IT industry and identify workplace or industry skill requirements; and to develop a sophisticated, critical approach to reflection by using assessment feedback and reflective frameworks to focus their reflective writing.

Final year Education students undertake ‘real world’ interview assessment. The ePortfolio process is introduced early in the Bachelor of Education. Students compile their ePortfolios across the course, drawing together theory-based learning and classroom practica, to evidence the Queensland Standards for Teachers. The Portfolio/ePortfolio then fulfils the assessment requirement and can be used to support formal employment-seeking processes.

Lynn McAllister and Kim HauvilleQueensland University of Technology | eLearning Services | Brisbane, Australia studenteportfolio@qut.edu.au

‘When you’re going through university some things seem irrelevant … then when you come

to learning through ePortfolio you see they really do relate to each other.’

3rd year Education

‘... these exercises (critical reflections) have assisted students to develop more critical reflection

and gain more understanding of the ANMC competencies ... It’s

definitely helped meet that first goal.’

Nursing unit coordinator

‘By doing the critical reflection you are actually

learning from your experience’

2nd year Engineering

‘… it allows you to bring together all the learnings, to see what you got from university and also your work

experiences and to relatethem to each other.’

3rd year Engineering

Kolb, D.A. (1984). Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and development. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.