Abstract:

Since the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, national governments worldwide have imposed measures and restrictions to reduce the transmission of the Coronavirus. These restrictions include, inter alia, prohibiting social gatherings and closing of higher education institutions. This has caused a shift in the way learning, teaching, and assessments are conducted. Universities worldwide have been forced to rely on educational technologies (EdTech) and rapidly move to virtual, online or distance learning as opposed to the traditional face-to-face interaction. This means that digital technologies have become an integral part of students’ learning and teaching. In addition, educational institutions have also been forced to change the way they assess students, from a sit-down to a digital assessment approach, which brings with it a bouquet of complexities and challenges, such as a lack of permanent access to technology, mitigating against dishonesty and cheating, etcetera.

Despite the pressure to move to an online pedagogy, lecturers have still endeavoured to maintain a quality and authentic learning approach to their learning and teaching practices. Admittedly, all learning and teaching also needs to embed graduate attributes and prepare students adequately for the world of work. With all of these aims still prevailing, there was a need to carefully select appropriate digital and pedagogical assessment tools and techniques.

Electronic portfolios (ePortfolios) or digital portfolios are considered to have the capacity to support students’ learning growth and development, and have the potential to enhance teaching, learning, and assessment practices. Despite the fact that ePortfolios are widely used as a learning tool in the classroom, they can also be used as an assessment tool to provide support to learning in order to achieve learning outcomes. In addition, with the use of adequate instruction integrated with the teaching content and the use of a suitable digital tool, ePortfolios can also provide desired transferable skills and electronic competencies (e-competencies). Transferable skills or soft skills involve a broad range of non-technical skills such as problem solving, critical thinking, creativity, communication skills, teamwork and conflict resolution.

Through the use of ePortfolios, students have an opportunity to apply these soft skills as well as reflective thinking in how they communicate their learning through creative ways that include multimedia and are able to assemble visually appealing records of their knowledge, skills and attributes acquired through the course.

This paper shows how ePortfolios have been integrated in an undergraduate Business Analysis course at a South African university to develop students’ reflective thinking and e-competencies. To ensure that the learning outcomes for Business Analysis students were not compromised, the teaching team designed and implemented a digital assessment intervention in the form of an ePortfolio. Students were required to make use of digital technologies such as Google drive and Google sites to complete an ePortfolio as part of a continuous assessment component. They received both formative and summative feedback. The aim was to allow students to reflect on the transferable skills practiced within the Business Analysis course work.This paper will discuss the lessons learnt and observations drawn from this experience.

Keywords:

Covid-19, ePortfolio, learning and teaching, higher education, digital technologies, Business Analysis, e-competencies, transferable skills, authentic learning.