Something I’ve noticed progress throughout my years of education has been the increase of technology in the classroom. From the early middle school transition from projector machines to smartboards technology is undeniably becoming a significant part of not only our educational experiences but in the work forces we will be joining. But, is this implementation a good thing and is it considered useful specifically in our small military school environment? While not all academic journals agree on this topic, I have found that a majority showed an overarching opinion of believing that by using technology to review and reflect upon our work we are better students and setting them up for success in their lives following school.

The two academic platforms I will be focusing on for this project will be VMI’s provided Eportfolio/ WordPress website and our online grading and communication platform, Canvas. The focal group for this project will be randomly selected seniors and Juniors where at Virginia Military Institute whose major is English. After further meetings and planning with Col McDonald I realized that by evaluating other majors I would not receive the same level of feedback based solely off of the fact non-liberal arts majors are stereotypically known for lack of writing and a. heavier focus on STEM minded concepts. The English majors’ responses provide me with the strongest base for my research based off of their extensive, mandatory use of both platforms.

Eportfolio is a platform whose lineage stems from what many would consider to be” old fashioned” paper portfolios. I feel as if the term “portfolio” is typically misunderstood as simply a collection of photographs or text, but it involves a step that many overlook, reflection and interaction. The idea of a portfolio is that it  is typically “the product of a course or program assignment that requires students to collect evidence of and reflect upon their academic accomplishments.” (source) Without discussing the evidence collected and things such as, how it could be improved, or what worked well, a portfolio is unnecessary.

The concept for this assignment was no one that was easy for me. My interest in studying the Eportfolio platforms stems from my job at the Virginia Military Institute as an Eportfolio tutor. Unfortunately, despite how useful the writing center and Eportfolio sector is, I have noticed a low number of students making appointments each semester. Yet, despite the low number of appointment suggesting that students claim to not need assistance of any sort. This lead my initial belief to be that student’s do not find Eportfolio to be useful in the slightest. It appeared that students did not care about implementing this into their everyday academic lives which to me makes it appear that that maybe it is not being used in the most effective way. This is unfortunate because studies have shown that when used the “right” way, Eportfolio can be useful to students across all curriculums to include STEM. (source)

“An Eportfolio, as all technologies, is a tool; a took that, in the right hands, under the right direction, and with the right effort can transform a student’s understanding, agency and world view- in the wrong hand, under the wrong direction, and without effort, and Eportfolio is simply a Web page.”(source)

My own initial personal reaction for Canvas was initially more positive but in an entirely different way.  From personal experience I can attest  that I rarely use it for teacher response interaction, but more strictly for file sharing and grade updates. While that is one of the purposes of this technology, it is not the only purpose. Much like Eportfolio Canvas has the intention of helping to foster student’s relationship with their own writing. The site offers abilities such as posting your work, creating chat rooms, and receiving critical feedback, most of which I believe students are either unable to find, or do not know exist.

*insert canvas quote from source 3*

After discussing with 8 of my peers I found that my own personal realizations were not far from the overall opinion of platforms. All of the students spoken to agreed that they knew what both Eportfolio and Canvas are and that they have a strong understanding of how to use both. Nearly all of us are asked to post our assignments online so that it is easier for teachers to locate them and grant us with immediate feedback without needing to come into the office for an official meeting. Seniors in particular have found that canvas is a necessity when posting because of the senior showcase. For us, this grants us the capability of showering potential employers a easy to access compilation of our work. These were some of the more positive responses I received while others were not as enthusiastic about Eportfolio.

When sitting around a table discussing Eportfolio with people I received comments such as, “What is it even supposed to be used for?” and “it costs the school extra money but most of us don’t even use it. I don’t like spending the extra money in my tuition.”  Comments such as these showed me a few things. First, that the majority of people are greatly misinformed, and that the younger ages aren’t as enthusiastic about the opportunities. I believe that in large part this has to do with our environment here at the Virginia Military Institute.

The situation is not necessarily that I think teachers are doing a bad job of using it with students, but I think that particularly at this school, where we have such personal relationships without teachers, we excel in face to face environments not using technology. When I chose to cme to VMI part of the appeal as the size of the classes. Upon my entering the school there was a 12 to 1 student teacher ratio. This is an impressively balanced ratio compared to much larger schools. Despite our small size we are still ranked among the top tiers with our educational programs. This being said, this technological disconnect may not be a problem specifically here but I worry that it may be in the “real world.”

Something I’ve noticed throughout my years of education has been the increase of technology in the classroom. From the transition from projector machines to smartboards technology is are evolving and significant part of our educational experiences. The questions in place are these; how students are reacting to the use of this technology and is this technology viewed as useful or “a waste of time?” (don’t like phrasing but general idea)

The two academic platforms I will be focusing on for this project will be VMI’s provided Eportfolio/ WordPress site and our online grading and communication platform, Canvas. The focal group for this project will be randomly selected first and second classmen at VMI who major in English. I felt that this group would provide me with the strongest base for my research based off of English majors’ extensive use of both platforms.

The concept for this assignment was no one that was easy for me. My interest in studying the Eportfolio platforms stems from my job at the Virginia Military Institute as an Eportfolio tutor. Unfortunately, despite how useful the writing center and Eportfolio sector is, I have noticed a low number of students making appointments each semester. Yet, despite the low number of appointment suggesting that students do not need assistance

Unfortunately, the progress I have made since our last meeting has been minimal. However, since our last class period, March 20^th, I have put some more thought into how exactly I intend to go about retrieving my data for the project. I am focusing my surveys on solely the second class (2019) and the first class (2018) based off of the fact that at this time I believe these two groups have had the most hands-on experience with both Canvas and Eportfolio. I have highlighted six first class cadets who would be willing to complete the survey as well as five second class cadet. I will not be posting those names because I believe it is personal information, but I can show you the highlighted list if you would like. I have also begun to compile a list of questions which I will have attached here.

Please Circle all that apply.

1. I use:

Eportfolio      Canvas      Both

2. I find this platform (s)

Not useful at all      Moderately useful      indifferent      useful      Extremely useful

Elaborate:_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3. How often do your teachers use said platforms?

Elaborate:_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

4. How would you rate the feedback you typically received from professors, peers, etc?

Not useful at all      Moderately Useful      Indifferent      Useful     Extremely useful

5. In what forms do you typically receive this feedback?

Hand written      Conference       Peer Review Workshops      Email

Elaborate:_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

6. Do you feel like using this/these platforms have had any effect on your writing process? Why or why not?

Elaborate:_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Existing Scholarship: 

From what I have understood, the effects of both Eportfolio/Canvas on the academic world of writing is a fairly newer concept of study. Thankfully this has not hindered my ability to find sources. These sources have, for the most part, been positive and support the implementation of Eportfolio into our academic world. Sitting in COL McDonald’s office for a mere twenty minutes produced various sources regarding the topic. While those are not sources which I currently have listed in my annotated bibliography, they provided me with confidence that this project would be feasible. The five sources I currently have in my annotated bibliography cover a broad range of focuses. I feel like by understanding Eporfolio as a whole I will be able to better analyze the data.I The existing scholarship I have evaluated covers a broad range of information; such as whether Eportoflio is useful, or if it is “over hyped,” how Eportfolio is being used to evaluate curriculum, and where Eportoflio began and where they hope it will be in the future. These are just three examples of the existing scholarship that I believe will essential in this project. 

Proposed Research: 

The question I am using to direct my research during this project is, “How does the Eporfotlio/Canvas process model extend the writing process and help us gain a new understand of our writing?” As an English major I personally spend a lot of time on both platforms. Therefore, I have decided to make English majors my focal study group. Because we are typicaly the group who spends the most time with these platforms I believe that we are the best option to use to gather data.  In the words of COL McDonald during our last conference, the purpose of these platforms is to, “Cultivate a metacognitive awareness of their (students) own learning.”  I think this is important because as the use of modern technology becomes more prevalent in our writing process it is important that we see benefits. Writing should not just happen once and never be used or evaluated again. It should also not be stored away online in a virtual filing cabinet. Sometimes I worry that we implement technology simply for implementation sake. Meaning that we use it because it is there, and we feel like we should. The question of how this effects our writing process and understand is extremely important to making sure that we truly are receiving the best education possible.  

Methodology: 

Throughout this project I have gone through a few scenarios regarding how to retrieve my data for analysis. Initially I was against trying to create a survey to send a round. I felt like this would narrow down what information I am able to gather in a negative way. After my meeting with COL McDonald I concluded that a survey may be my best option. This option is most compatible with the time I have available to me here and the time left in the semester. This survey will not be multiple choice, but will be open ended, consisting of 5 key questions that I will read and evaluate. As of now these questions will be as follows; Do you use Eportoflio/Canvas word platforms? How often/ when do you post on them? Honestly, do you find it useful? Who do you generally receive feedback from using these platforms? Is this feedback generally good, bad, or unnecessary? My focus group will be 5 English majors from the class of ’20,’19 and ’18 I hope to use this information combined with the existing research to see how Portfolio and Canvas are effecting the academic writing “scene.”  

Annotated Bibliography: 

Fitch, Dale, et al. “THE USE OF EPORTFOLIOS IN EVALUATING THE CURRICULUM AND STUDENT LEARNING.” Journal of Social Work Education, vol. 44, no. 3, 2008, pp. 37–54. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/23044338. 

This source begins with a quote stating that the Eportfolio is intended to be used as a “content management system.” According to this source, portfolios have become more popular in the past few years, even coming as far as programs like Eportfolio begin created. These portoflios are intended to help educators step back and evaluate how an individual student is doing and lend some influence on how future curriculum should be. I believe that this source will be usual to my project because it focuses heavily on both the teachers and the students. This allows me to see some perspective on how teachers use it (or intend to) and how they believe that using this technology has helped their students develop their own writing. 

Lombardi, Judy. “To Portfolio or Not to Portfolio: Helpful or Hyped?” College Teaching, vol. 56, no. 1, 2008, pp. 7–10.JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/27559345. 

Immediately in this source the author shares the cumulative belief that the reactions to Eporfolio in the classroom have been primarily positive. However, she immediately follows up that abstract statement with a quote form a teacher who was employed by the same people as Ms. Lombardi. The quote states that the use of Eporfolio was the sole purpose for this educator’s resignation. They felt as if it was a waste of time and resources and was not responsible for the success students feel following an assignment. The reason I find this quote so significant is because, by implementing this quote followed by a positive quote, she shows that she has fully evaluated both angles of the debate. Because of this, I plan to use this source as the base article for whether this platform matters or has been a determent to the academic world.   

Pauline Roberts, et al. “EPortfolio-Based Learning Environments: Recommendations for Effective Scaffolding of Reflective Thinking in Higher Education.” Journal of Educational Technology & Society, vol. 19, no. 4, 2016, pp. 22–33., www.jstor.org/stable/jeductechsoci.19.4.22. 

This source my Pauline Roberts is another example of a source that focuses on both the good and the bad of Eporfolio. While looking for sources I have found that ones such as this give me a sense of trust when it comes to the information I am reading because of their thoroughness and willingness to evaluate more than just their own personal bias. This source does not deny that Eporfolio is a useful tool but focuses on evaluating whether Eporfolio is being used in the most effective way. What is different about this source is that the primary focus of it is to give recommendations on how they believe Eporfolio usage could be altered or changed entirely to benefit higher education. They do not simply state complaints or short comings, but offer up plausible solutions. 

Watson, C. Edward, and Peter E. Doolittle. “EPortfolio Pedagogy, Technology, and Scholarship: Now and in the Future.” Educational Technology, vol. 51, no. 5, 2011, pp. 29–33. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/44429948. 

In order to understand the effect Eporfolio has had on the academic community I believe that it is important to understand where this platform began.  This article begins with a brief overview of when the Eporfolio platform began and how various organizations immediately reacted to it. Like in other reviews of Eportfolio I have gone over the reviews tend to be more positive and optimistic. What I like about this article is that it specifically addresses whether Eportfolio has met all the expectations it was intended to. And for the ones which are “no” they explore why. This gives me information which to base my question of whether or not  Eporfolio is useful off of.  

Yoo, Hyesoo. “A Web-Based Environment for Facilitating Reflective Self Assessment of Choral Conducting Students.”Contributions to Music Education, vol. 41, 2016, pp. 113–130., www.jstor.org/stable/24711131. 

While this specific source focuses primarily on choral students and their self-reflection of pieces on the internet, I feel like it allows me another perspective other than that I have experienced personally and that I will with my research. Much like my project this source studies ten students (mine will be a little more) and their journey through the analysis processes.  I plan to not only study the information they received, but the way they went about conducting the experiment as a sort of inspiration for me, who has never conducted something like this. 

How do students go about writing their papers? This question is one that has been on my mind since my sophomore year at VMI. My own personal development has shown me that everyone begins their paper differently and while it may be what we like, it is not always what is best for us. I began with our usual outlines and filling in. Over time I have determined that the method that is best for me to write up a draft “cold” without stopping and then revising my writing multiple times later. The follow up and support question I wonder about is what steers students towards making this decision. Is it because they have not been taught various pre-writing methodology by their teachers? Or is it because procrastination is such a drastic problem amongst my generation, especially in college? 

I realize that this may seem like a semi broad topic for my paper, but I believe I can narrow down my research with scholarly journals and surveys that cadets fill out. I am not sure at this moment if I would want to drop surveys off to various random rooms, or if I would like to interview at least two students from various majors. I think it is important to incorporate various majors because as English majors, we tend to have a more extensive education regarding writing (I think this also comes from our natural passion regarding writing). As stem majors what they are expected to know and what they are expected to do is drastically different. Regardless, I think it is important that we teach all majors the same information so that everyone has a fair chance of being able ot write properly and to the best of their abilities. 

Annotated Bibliography 

Burnett, MacCurdy. “Differential Methodologies for Freshmen.”College Composition and Communication, vol. 9, no. 2, 1958, pp. 116–122. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/355347. 

I believe that this is a significant source for me because it not only applies to my peer group and my most recent experiences, but it shows us a starting point. After reading the first few pages I realized that the concepts within this article are very beginner and concrete? This does not necessarily mean they are wrong though. The article suggests things such as reading out loud, stopping every few paragraphs and evaluating, and writing down your ideas. The following class the article mentions having students transcribe a specific pre-chosen concept of their reading and re writing it 18 times minimum. This seems elementary for college students, but I find it interesting and see the purpose. A foundation such as this is something that is extremely important to writing successfully. The general idea of this is that the person be able to properly comprehend the information they are receiving so that they can properly translate and share their own ideas.  

Duin, Ann Hill, and Michael F. Graves. “Intensive Vocabulary Instruction as a Prewriting Technique.” Reading Research Quarterly, vol. 22, no. 3, 1987, pp. 311–330. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/747971. 

This source provides a specific method of prewriting with evidence to support it. This particular method focuses heavily on intensive vocabulary. The paper was written in response to observations from a guided study consisting of 80 students who were taught 13 “target words” over six days. This provides me with a different method that I didn’t even think was possible. This is one of potentially three methods I would like to explore and use as examples. 

Kellogg, Ronald T. “Effectiveness of Prewriting Strategies as a Function of Task Demands.” The American Journal of Psychology, vol. 103, no. 3, 1990, pp. 327–342. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/1423213. 

This source immediately begins with painting the image of college students sitting in a classroom and approaching writing an essay. Some students began writing immediately and used zero prewriting time, some students crated a basic outline, and others created a “cluster” or visual graph of sorts. These are all different methods, and each has its benefits or lack of.  I feel like this source will provide me with an observation and step by step account of students writing processes. This source also discussed what types of assignments require different types of information from students and how this effects their writing processes. This opened my eyes to another factor that effects how we go about writing and preparing to write and made me realize I am going to need to expand on my research and considerations.  

For teachers to understand how to help teach students rhetoric, it is important that they understand its origins and definitions. If you were to  look up the word “rhetoric” in Webster’s dictionary it would be defined as “the art of persuasion.” This definition still held true in 2500 but what was different was the belief on whether or not it should be practiced by the common man.   Some people believe that the word “rhetoric” applies to the act of deceiving the public into believing what you believe. This was one of Plato’s fears during the classical rhetoric era. He feared that people would learn the art of rhetoric and use it to further their own personal agendas. I have noticed in class discussions that we tend to quickly argue and disagree entirely with Plato’s belief. While it is true that what he was essentially calling for was to limit the publics ability to speak for themselves and have an effect. But, what I find fascinating is the fact that what he feared holds some truth. While rhetoric is involved in every aspect of our lives, and a necessity, it is often used by people who are uneducated in their field. Having the knowledge of rhetoric appears to me to be a double edged sword. So where is the compromise? This is assuming that their is one.

Test test test

“What is rhetoric?”  This is a question with many answers and was the first question we were asked in class. To me, the answer was as simple as persuasion. That’s it, one word. What I did not realize was that this class was going to be the opportunity to explore the question further. I asked myself questions like, how did rhetoric come to be, how has it evolved, and what are the theories regarding it? The most fascinating answer to this question came from the time of the ancient Greece between the Sophists and Plato. Both agreed rhetoric existed, but they disagreed on several of the key components of rhetoric itself and who should be able to practice it.  

The first and most significant question to me was who should be able to practice rhetoric. Not only as this question interesting in general but it is something that is directly involved with the abilities I have today. This was one of the main things that the two key groups I am focusing on, the Sophists and Plato (Philosophers) were divided on.   

The sophists were a group of nomadic teachers who traveled to new cultures with the intention of teaching those who could pay about rhetoric and how to practice it effectively. The philosophers, in works such as Gorgias, initially denied that rhetoric was even in art. Later in Phaedrus they agreed it was an art but only when practiced by Philosophers. What men such as Plato feared was that the sophists were giving the public much more than the ability to be eloquent. They feared that by giving them this new-found skill people would be able to persuade others for selfish reasons.  

The philosophers main concern was that people would be using this new found “power” in a negative way. They believed that they would do this by preaching beliefs that they held in order to fulfill their own agendas. The danger comes when they do this without educating themselves properly. This belief stemmed heavily from their belief in the “Big T” truth and the “Little t” truth.  “Big T” truth refers to the ultimate divine truth of the gods. This was the support to the Philosophers used when debating whether the skill of rhetoric should become public. They believed that because they were philosophers they were the only ones who possessed this special connection, thus making them the only ones who had the knowledge to actually speak publicly.  

“Little t” truth refers to a universal and relative truth that is ever changing. The sophists did not believe in one entity having the power of “every seeing knowledge” because of their relationships with various cultures. Because they had seen so many different cultures interact they had seen many different beliefs actually, play out.  Now that it has been made clear what these divisions wear, I am going to focus on the significance they played in where we are today.  

Imagine a world where the only people who were taught rhetorical techniques (or even know what rhetoric was) were our religious leaders and our own modern-day equivalents of philosophers. I.e. politicians. That would put “common” people, such as myself and those currently sitting around me, at a great disadvantage in our influence that we have in our lives and the world around us.  This is what would have happened had  

Next Paragraph: Ways we went about learning, understanding and practicing this knowledge  

“What is rhetoric?” is a question with many answers and the first question we were asked in class. To me the answer was as simple as persuasion. That’s it, one word. What I did not realize was that this was the opportunity to explore the question further. I asked myself questions like, how did rhetoric come to be, how has it evolved, and what are the theories regarding it? The most fascinating answer to this question came from the time of the ancient Greece between the sophists and Plato. Both agreed rhetoric was a thing, but they differed on several key components.  

The first and most significant question to me was who should be able to practice rhetoric. Not only as this question interesting in general but it is something that is directly involved with the abilities I have today. This was one of the main things that the two key groups I am focusing on, the Sophists and Plato (Philosophers) were divided on.  

The sophists were a group of nomadic teachers who traveled to new cultures with the intention of teaching those who could pay about rhetoric and how to practice it effectively. The philosophers, in works such as Gorgias, initially denied that rhetoric was even in art. Later in Phaedrus they agreed it was an art but only when practiced by Philosophers. What men such as Plato feared was that the sophists were giving the public much more than the ability to be eloquent. They feared that by giving them this new-found skill people would be able to persuade others for selfish reasons. 

The philosophers were worried that people would be using this power in a negative way and preach uneducated beliefs to fulfill their own agendas.  This belief stemmed heavily from their belief in the “Big T” truth and the “Little t” truth.  “Big T” truth refers to the ultimate divine truth of the gods. This was the support to the Philosophers used when debating whether the skill of rhetoric should become public. They believed that because they were philosophers they were the only ones who possessed this special connection, thus making them the only ones who had the knowledge to actually speak publicly. 

“Little t” truth refers to a universal and relative truth that is ever changing. The sophists did not believe in one entity having the power of “every seeing knowledge” because of their relationships with various cultures. Because they had seen so many different cultures interact they had seen many different beliefs actually, play out.  Now that it has been made clear what these divisions wear, I am going to focus on the significance they played in where we are today. 

Next paragraph: Why I feel it affects me 

Next Paragraph: Ways we went about learning, understanding and practicing this knowledge