Ashford 7: – Week 6 – Discussion 1

Your initial discussion thread is due on Day 3 (Thursday) and you have until Day 7 (Monday) to respond to your classmates. Your grade will reflect both the quality of your initial post and the depth of your responses. Reference the Discussion Forum Grading Rubric for guidance on how your discussion will be evaluated.

This discussion is your opportunity to receive feedback on the Week Six Final Paper and ePortfolio Assignment. Remember, submitting this information earlier in the week is advised to allow peers and the instructor ample time to offer feedback to you that you can use to revise your final assignment before submission.

Initial Post – In your initial post, submit a link to your ePortfolio (Pathbrite) from the Week Six Assignment and attach your draft document of the final assignment to the message. In the message of your initial post:

• In at least one paragraph, discuss your takeaways from this course.  What new learning transpired for you in this course? What will you carry with you to your current or future classroom? 
• In at least one paragraph, discuss how action research can influence educational change within the classroom, district, and nationwide. 

Guided Response: Respond to at least two peers. Consider reviewing the Grading Rubric for the Week Six Assignment and using language from the rubric in your feedback to peers about their projects. For optimal engagement with your learning peers, you are encouraged to re-engage in the discussion by replying to posts made in response to you by the instructor and peers. Timely feedback to peers will be most helpful to them in the finalization of their Week Six Assignment!

Ashford 7: – Week 6 – Final Paper

Final Paper and ePortfolio

You will create an ePortfolio that includes redesigned activities from prior coursework in the Masters of Arts in Education (MAED) Program that demonstrate your competency with the nine Program Learning Outcomes, which are also the Course Learning Outcomes for EDU 695. Additionally, you will write a narrative reflection of your experience with the program and the ePortfolio construction. The overarching goal of this Final Paper and ePortfolio assignment is to showcase learning from the MAED Program in a consolidated, web-based format that can easily be shared with anyone: colleagues, potential or current employers, friends, family members, and others. For the ePortfolio, you use a system called Pathbrite. Within this ePortfolio, you will tell the story of your educational journey and value of your personal MAED experience as it applies to the labor market. Remember, the ePortfolio is your chance to show what you know and are able to do in the practice of teaching and learning with technology. You will submit a link to your ePortfolio and attach your paper portion of the assignment in a Week Six discussion for preliminary feedback by peers and the instructor before the final submission. The earlier you submit in the Week Six discussion the more opportunity you have for input from your peers and instructor to improve your work before the final submission of this assignment.

Creating the Final Paper and ePortfolio
Please include a link to the ePortfolio (Pathbrite) within the paper portion of this assignment. As needed, refer to the MAED program learning outcomes (PLOs) list. Then, create your final assignment to meet the content and written communication expectations below.

Content Expectations

• ePortfolio Components (5 Points): Include at least one artifact demonstrating mastery for each of the nine MAED Program Learning Outcomes (PLOs). 

• ePortfolio Design (3 Points): Design the ePortfolio to be professional in appearance. Be sure to exemplify effective and ethical uses of technology so that the ePortfolio logically organized in a visually appealing way.

• Narrative – Ranking (5 Points): Rank and discuss the importance of each Program Learning Outcome to your individual work setting, including an explanation of each ranking and its value to you in your learning environment or your position. Discuss how you currently use each PLO in your work setting and, if PLOs are not used, discuss ways you might begin to use them in your current or future work setting. If you are unemployed or otherwise do not work in a teaching role, you can either (a) use a previous work location, or (b) imagine the perfect work location (e.g., your dream job), and use that fictional work center to rank and discuss each PLO. The overall goal of this section of the narrative is to rank each PLO according to its importance to you as an educator or potential educator, starting by listing the most important PLO to you first.

• Narrative – Challenges/Solutions (5 Points): Discuss the design and development challenges you experienced while creating this ePortfolio in Pathbrite and explain how you overcame those challenges. If you feel that you did not face any challenges during your design/redesign, please state that there were no challenges and clearly support this statement with a discussion of the details, or reflect and think deeply about your design/redesign process and offer a detailed narrative of how the process excelled. Examples of challenges include: (a) getting accustomed to specific technology to communicate and showcase your learning, (b) difficulty ranking the PLOs, (c) finding creative ways to display your newly learned skill sets, and (d) tying together concepts and theories into one cohesive digital collection. When you explain how you resolved or worked around challenges you need to consider how you became proficient in using various digital tools, how you linked PLOs to your job responsibilities, how Internet searches uncovered new ways to utilize your talents, how peer collaboration produced ways to effectively consolidate multiple concepts and theories in one package, and how ePortfolio examples sparked creative thought. 

Written Communication Expectations

• Page Requirement (.5 points): Include one page per discussion of each of the nine MAED Program Learning Outcomes and a tenth page for the narrative response for a total of ten pages (not including the title and reference pages).

• APA Formatting (.5 points): Use APA formatting consistently throughout the assignment.

• Syntax and Mechanics (.5 points): Display meticulous comprehension and organization of syntax and mechanics, such as spelling and grammar.

• Source Requirement (.5 points): Reference three scholarly sources in addition to the course textbook. All sources on the references page need to be used and cited correctly within the body of the assignment.

For information related to APA style, including samples and tutorials, please visit the Ashford Writing Center.