Abstract
This article examines the implementation of e-portfolio (ePF) as an innovative and alternative form of assessment in the French and German language courses of the European Studies undergraduate programme at HKBU. It focuses on the potentials of ePF in achieving Course Intended Learning Outcomes (CILO): how it helps students improve their language skills and, at a broader level, how it helps students develop their intercultural and reflexive competence in handling an increasingly diverse variety of situations in our increasingly globalized world. To begin with, we believe in the necessity to implement innovative teaching to foster our graduates’ capacity for lifelong learning through ePF. A qualitative and quantitative research was then conducted to analyse samples of our students’ reflexive and critical essays in their ePFs, along with questionnaires distributed to study their views towards portfolio keeping. The results obtained are in favour of the implementation of ePF in foreign language classes although they also reveal the issue that students could be disorientated in using ePF, which initially requires attention.
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« L’individu n’est plus le produit de sa culture, il en est au contraire l’acteur, il l’élabore, la construit en fonction de stratégies diversifiées, selon les besoins et les circonstances » (Abdallah-Pretceille 1999: 55).
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Appendix: Prompts
Appendix: Prompts
French | German |
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What to write in learning experiences? In this category, you are required to reflect about an experience you had in the target language (movie, documentary, article, blog, Facebook post, book, radio program etc.). You are required to write at least two entries • What did you see/read? • Names: director, author, actors, main characters, year of publication/production • Write a short summary • Why did you choose this film? Why did you read it? • What is the main theme of the film/book? • Your comments: this is your reflection. (ca. 150 Words), e.g.: – What surprised you? – What did you not understand well? Why? – What do you think about the topic, the characters? Is it the same/different in your country? – Did you read more about this topic? – How much of the language did you understand? Did you use the subtitles? – Was there a dialog/a sentence or a word that you would like to use in your everyday life? What to write in the journal? In the journal you are required to reflect in depth about a topic seen in class. You are required to write at least three journal entries • Tell us what topic you chose and why? • Tell us what you know about this topic and what you would like to know further. What resources are you going to use to learn more? • Tell us what more you have now learnt about this topic. What resources have you used till now? • Tell us what more you have now learnt about this topic. What is the difference in your knowledge now than it was in your first entry? • Tell us how you feel about this topic now? Was it an important topic? Did you find enough resources to learn more? Do you want to know more still? Or is this enough? What to write in creativity? You need to produce an artefact that show you’re using creatively the target language/culture and you need to reflect on your ‘creation’ in a short text (±200 words): why did you choose to do this, what did you learn doing so about the language, the culture, how was the process of the creation | Part 1: About the movie There are three movies on the list that deal with “reunification”. Choose one of them • Go Trabi Go • Good Bye, Lenin! • Sonnenallee 1. Write a summary after you have watched the movie (200–250 words) 2. Describe and explain the topic of the movie 3. Answer the following questions: • Did you like the movie? What exactly did you like? What did you not like? • How difficult was it to understand the movie? • Why did you choose this movie? • Have you encountered anything about the movie or the topic itself before watching? • How difficult was it to recognize the topic of the movie? • What do you already know about this topic? • Which information do you want to explore? Part 2: Research You are expected to do a research on your chosen topic and establish a contemporary connection. Use as many resources as possible (literature from the library, literature from the internet, audio files, videos, contemporary witness reports, interviews with German-speaking students, …) Document and reflect this activity: • What have you done at the beginning to get more information? • Which resources helped you the most to get information the easiest? • How did you select the information? • Which challenges did you encounter? • Did you expect these challenges? • How could you cope with them? Part 3: Learning process • Could you benefit from your prior knowledge? • What did you learn about the topic with the research? • To what extent is this topic of current interest? Describe this in detail. • Did you learn anything about the German language? • Do you think, you could enhance your intercultural competence? If so, how? If not, why not? • What did you learn that you definitely want to keep for your next research task and which aspects need to be changed, improved or neglected? |
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Chui, C.S., Dias, C. (2017). The Integration of E-Portfolios in the Foreign Language Classroom: Towards Intercultural and Reflective Competences. In: Chaudhuri, T., Cabau, B. (eds) E-Portfolios in Higher Education. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-3803-7_4
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