The presentation covers the development of a personal development planning resource using Google Apps for Education

1. Managing Personal
Development Planning using
Google Apps for Education
Robin Trangmar
Dr. Claire Lloyd
Head of Education & Training, Coleg
Llandrillo
Lecturer in Education & Training,
Coleg Llandrillo

2. Overview
iPDP (Individual Personal Development Plan) being
developed on the Teacher Education courses at Coleg
Llandrillo.
 The iPDP uses Google Sites, Drive and Groups to
support trainee teachers and track and manage
assessment artefacts during their course

3. Portfolio Issues
Just so much paper
Compiled at the end of the year
Didn‟t really contribute to any development
Retained by the student, so if they didn‟t have it no-one
could see what they were doing
Lost hand-outs, resources, course forms, marked
assessment work
Staff found it hard to track student progress
Students found it easy to hide
 „I‟ve left it at home‟ …
 Not attending tutorials … and thus not producing work

4. Previous efforts …
PebblePad
 Ran a trial in 2007
 Cost implications
Mahara + Moodle
 Too steep a learning curve
 Portability issues
 Institutional hosting issues

5. Moodle
GLLM still running Moodle 1.9 …
No linkage with Mahara
Moodle unpopular with students
Moodle not really a Web 2.0 platform
Anything created in Moodle would be
 Messy
 Not portable

6. What we wanted (1)
To have a resource that was at the heart of the trainee
teacher‟s progress
Something that was transparent and available to
 the trainee teacher,
 the workplace mentor, and
 any of the teacher educators
Something that was updatable by all parties and in one
common „space‟

7. What we wanted (2)
Storage: somewhere for
 staff to store course documents, research papers etc for
student access
 students to store assessed work
 students to have a personal storage space that staff can
access
One single place for
 Course resources and teaching materials
 Student work
Students to have greater engagement with cloud-based
resources so they were aware of possibilities for their
own students

8. Here is Edward Bear, coming
downstairs now, bump, bump,
bump, on the back of his head,
behind Christopher Robin.
It is, as far as he knows, the
only way of coming downstairs,
but sometimes he feels there
really is another way, if only
he could stop bumping for a
moment and think of it.
(A.A. Milne 1926; 15)
Source: Milne, A.A., 1926 The World of Pooh. London; Methuen.
Image: Pete Rollins http://peterrollins.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/pooh_stairs.jpeg

9. The inspiration
Cheryl Reynolds – Senior Lecturer at
Huddersfield University on the PGCE
programmes
 Developed and tested an iPDP using a Google
Site from which her students created a replica
 She shared this with us
We took the model, mapped it to our own
course requirements, and added a few tweaks

10. Google Apps for Education (GAfE)
Following the 2012 merger, GLLM moved the email
system to Google Apps for Education (GAfE)
This presented within the GLLM domain
 Gmail
 Calendars
 Sites
 Drive
 Groups
 … and recently Google Plus and Google Hangouts

11. Creating the iPDP
We created one Google Site and set it up as a
Template, which was then shared with students
They created a copy
We managed the Site permissions so that tutors have
editing rights
We provided a half-day‟s training and helped the
students to create and customise their iPDP

12. The iPDP isn‟t …
An ePortfolio
 “… a purposeful collection of information and digital
artefacts that demonstrates development or evidences
learning outcomes, skills or competencies. The process
of producing an ePortfolio (writing, typing, recording etc.)
usually requires the synthesis of ideas, reflection on
achievements, self-awareness and forward planning; with
the potential for educational, developmental or other
benefits.”
(Cotterill 2007)
… but it could be

13. Main Points
 Each part of the course has its own area, description of
assessment tasks, access to relevant forms, a place for
uploading personal completed work
 Simple, one / two-click access
 Journals
 Observations, evaluations
 Assignments
 Research document support
 Courseware
 Links to Google Site for each module of study
 Discussion area - Google Group (weak point)
 Assignment upload - Google Group (weak point)

14. Front End

15. Main Areas
Assessment Area
Personal Workspace
Course Admin Area
Handbooks, Video help files, Document
Templates
Taught Modules

16. Personal storage space
Students can add own research, notes, drafts etc
Tutors can add additional reading to support learning

17. Use of Drive
No template documents are stored in the iPDP Site
All templates are located in folders in the Google Drive
shared folder
The shared folder is inserted („linked‟) into the iPDP
Site page, and any updates to files in the Google Drive
shared folder occur automagically

18. Back End

19. Course Modules

20. iTutor
Central dashboard Site for staff to access resources

21. Progress
Quick uptake - „intuitive‟
User friendly
The ability to reverse disasters is very useful …
Students prefer it to Moodle (!)
Several students have developed Sites for their own
students
Some students are doing their
tutorials via Google Hangouts
reducing the need to travel

22. Limitations
Gmail filters to redirect student emails
Submitting assessment work via a Group
Can‟t track activity / engagement with resources on the
module Sites
A few students find the page editing process
challenging
Initial inability for students to export the iPDP after the
course ends (GAfE domain limitations)
 Found a work-around through using a standard Gmail
account

23. Short and Long Term Evaluation
Initial anecdotal feedback from students
Developing the original template as tutors experience
problems
Investigating why the current cohort of students are
using the iPDP effectively
 Use of TPACK (Technological, Pedagogical and Content
Knowledge) survey to benchmark skills
End of year review
Sharing findings with Cheryl Reynolds

24. Contact details
Robin Trangmar
 r.trangmar@gllm.ac.uk
 @yrathro
 Presentation on SlideShare at

25. References
Cotterill, SJ (2007). What is an ePortfolio? ePortfolios
2007, Maastricht http://www.eportfolios.ac.uk/definition
accessed 12 December 2013
Koehler, M. J., & Mishra, P. (2005). What happens
when teachers design educational technology? The
development of technological pedagogical content
knowledge. Journal of Educational Computing
Research, 32(2), 131-152
Milne, A. A., 1926. The World of Pooh. London;
Methuen.