| Artifacts are all examples of a
learner's work included in the personal development collection. Artifacts are most
frequently pictures because that is the medium easiest to manipulate and because most of
the items learners select for their portfolio are 2-dimensional objects or pictures of
their work that are taken with digital cameras. Other popular artifact media are sounds,
and movies. The word
"artifact" is chosen because of the metaphor it brings to mind when considering
archeology: In the same way that students of ancient civilizations try to understand a
civilization from shards of evidence (artifacts), the artifacts in a personal development
collection are shards of evidence from a learner's work. That explains why learners
are encouraged to cull artifacts and select the artifacts that best represent their
growth.
In order to give learners a large number of artifacts from
which to select those to include in a PDC, educators should try to create a collecting
culture in their school. In a school that has developed a collecting culture, plans are
made and practice is supported in these aspects of working with artifacts:
Digitizing Artifacts is the process of
getting an artifact into a format that can be used by computer systems. Pictures, sound,
and video can be stored in a number of formats, the format ePDC authors choose will depend
on the hardware available as well as the software to be used for editing the artifacts and
the software used to author the ePDC. Here is a presentation
that reviews some file formats that are typically encountered when authoring ePDC's.
Digitizing artifacts does require some hardware, as well. This presentation
introduces some of the necessary hardware.
Organizing Artifacts is a task that
becomes immediately necessary for schools with active collecting cultures. To understand
the scope of the problem of organizing a school's artifacts, do some simple math: multiply
the number of students in the school by the number of artifacts each is likely to create,
and remember the goal of a collecting culture is to provide sufficient artifacts that ePDC
authors can cull artifacts. If we assume 400 students in a school and each student
digitizes one artifact each week, and the school enrolls 6 grades, then we can expect
there to be 400 students * 5 grades * 30 weeks = 60,000 artifacts at the beginning of the
school year and 72,000 artifacts at the end of the school year!
A computer network is a tool particularly well-suited to
the task of organizing artifacts and making those artifacts available throughout the area
serviced by a local area network. One model that is used in southwestern Vermont was
developed by a student in grade 7 and refined by the same students while in grade 8. His
system used PowerPoint presentations embedded in a series of web pages that were browsed
using Internet Explorer. This system was available only on computers connected to the
intranet, so Internet privacy was not a concern for system administrators. That system is
introduced here and
illustrated here.
The essential feature of any system used to organize
artifacts is a well-understood logic for organizing and labeling similar artifacts so that
users can quickly find relevant artifacts. Use caution, however, that the organization
does not become so cumbersome that whoever is responsible for administering the system is
not overloaded.
Selecting Artifacts
In schools with active collecting cultures, learners will
have many artifacts to select from when deciding how to demonstrate his or her growth. To
be truly meaningful, the artifacts that are selected for the portfolio will be chosen by
the learner. The Continuum of
Artifacts has been developed to help learners decide which artifacts to select.
Educators frequently express concern that learners will not
select "the best" examples of work, or will seek to ensure that certain
artifacts are selected for the PDC. Those educators are reminded that learners'
perceptions of their knowledge is as important as the knowledge itself, so the learners
must have autonomy in selecting artifacts for PDC's.
Those educators who seek to collect standard artifacts from
all students or who seek to include other information about student's growth in the PDC
are advised to maintain separate sections of the PDC for such artifacts.
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