This year the eLearning leaders at our school were asked to find a “cost-effective” way to allow students to create digital portfolios (ePortfolios) that can be exhibited during the school’s end-of-year exhibition. Evernote was definitely considered as an option, but the cost of the premium account was a deterrent. Additionally, we wanted something that can easily be viewed on the Internet to help with the portfolio assessment process and to share with parents.

I have always been a big fan of Google Tools, and I’m an even bigger fan of Google Sites. However, the Google Sites interface is not the most iPad-friendly, and uploading attachments requires a slightly longer process and a lot of patience. But, it’s feasible!

I noticed that on Twitter, the whole discussion about ePortfolios for iPads does not mention Google Sites at all. Surely, there are more iPad-friendly tools like Evernote, Three Rings and Easy Portfolio. But our school is a Google school, and so all our staff and students have Google accounts, that’s the first reason we decided to choose Google Sites. Secondly, building an ePortfolio on Google Sites will not follow the same process on the iPad as it would on a laptop/desktop computer, as there is no ‘hard disk’ on the iPad from which you can directly upload the artifacts to be exhibited. That presents challenges, but I still insist that it is doable, so long as teachers & students are patient and keep an open mind.

The combination of apps our students use to build those portfolios includes: Pages, Keynote, ShowMe, iMovie, Notability, Google Drive iPad app, and Safari. Any document the students have on Keynote or Pages can be uploaded directly on Google Drive through the iPad app, and I ask them to ‘open in Google Drive’ as a PDF (because it preserves formatting). If the students have a video on iMovie, it can be exported to the Camera Roll and then uploaded on Google Drive through the iPad app, the same with any photos in their Camera Roll. If students have work on ShowMe, it can be uploaded onto their ShowMe.com profile, and then the ShowMe can be ’embedded’ directly into the Google Site by using the embed code. If students have any annotated PDFs on Notability, they can be similarly exported to the Google Drive iPad app. I think that pretty much covers all student work!

Basically, I tell my students to upload one artifact at a time, and then create a Google Document in which they will write up their reflection on that artifact. Once all artifacts are uploaded, and the associated reflections are written up, students then must change the sharing setting of these artifacts and reflections to ‘anyone with the link…’ and ‘can view’. Each artifact is then hyperlinked in the Google Sites ePortfolio, and the associated reflection is embedded right under it.

Here are the detailed written steps of this process, followed by some video how-tos:

Detailed Written Steps:
1- Create a folder in Google Drive (through the iPad app) called ‘Portfolio Items’ or ‘Portfolio Artefacts and Reflections’.

2- Choose the artefact you want to upload, whether it is a Pages document or a Keynote presentation and ‘Open in Google Drive’ as a PDF. You can also directly upload pictures or videos from your Camera Roll onto the Google Drive iPad app.

3- Once an artefact is uploaded onto Google Drive, rename it so you can easily identify it later, and then create a new Google Document where you will write up the reflection associated with that artefact. Give that Google Document a name similar to the artefact but with the words ‘reflection on…’ at the beginning.

4- Repeat steps 2 & 3 for all other artefacts you wish to upload and reflections for each artefact.

5- Once all artefacts are uploaded and each artefact has its own associated reflection, log onto Google Drive through Safari.

6- Select the artefacts and associated reflections and change their visibility (through the ‘sharing’ button) to ‘anyone with the link…’ and ‘can view’.

7- Open the artefact you want to add to your Portfolio from Google Drive and copy the ‘hyperlink’ to it.

8- Go to your ePortfolio on Google Sites and click ‘edit page’ and type a sentence that explains what the artefact is.

9- Select a part of that sentence that you want to ‘hyperlink’ and click the ‘link’ button at the edit bar, then paste the link to the artefact from Google Drive as a ‘web address’ Remember to select ‘Open in a new window’.

10- After you have hyperlinked the artefact, the next step is to embed the associated reflection. Click ‘insert’ at the top of your Google Site and select ‘Document’ from the menu of options. You will be taken to your Google Drive Documents and select the required document.

I published these steps and the videos on this Google Site for the staff and students’ reference: iPad Portfolio How-tos

I would like to clarify that I am not arguing that this is the ‘best’ way of creating digital portfolios on iPads, or that it is more superior to the other options like Evernote, Three Rings or Easy Portfolios. I am merely arguing that schools who might be in similar circumstances to our school can choose this as an option, and that while the process on the iPad is not as intuitive and the interface is not the most iPad-friendly one, it’s still DOABLE!