Walking Through iWebfolio

Below is a screen presentation by Rich Robles in one of his Gateway to University Honors classes.  Rich walks through iWebfolio, its features and the University Honors e-portfolio template.

Walking through iWebfolio from Rich Robles on Vimeo.

Obtaining an E-Portfolio Account

Beginning in fall 2008, incoming students will be using the iWebfolio product from Nuventive. To begin using the iWebfolio product, download the instructions to obtain your account. You will need a credit card to complete the transaction. When selecting the account duration, first-year students must select the 5-year option. 

General Account Guide

A student account is also known as an "owner" account. This guide is for account owners to guide them through the portfolio interface. Notable instructions (book marked in the PDF) include how to insert a hyperlink, pasting content from a Microsoft Word document, and creating a customized reviewer.

Accessing the Honors E-Portfolio Template

A template has been provided for you to begin working on your portfolio. Access these instructions to begin.   The necessary headings have already been created for you. All you have to to is upload your content. To personalize your account, you can change the layout based on a palate of colors and layouts.

Submitting Your E-portfolio

To submit your e-portfolio for review, you have to "lock" the portfolio. Open your e-portfolio in edit mode. Click the "General" tab in the horizontal tool bar. Under the e-portfolio description you will see a check-box to "Lock Portfolio." Then click "Save." Locking the portfolio creates an official time stamp when it was officially submitted. Once you 'Lock' a portfolio you will not be able to make any changes to the portfolio until either a reviewer, who has permissions to your portfolio, has released it back to you, or 30 days have passed. This feature allows a reviewer to ensure you have not modified your portfolio after a due date.

Creating a Unique URL for your Portfolio

You can use your e-portfolio as your personal website with a public web address. When revising your portfolio in edit mode, click the "General" tab. Underneath the "Lock Portfolio" check box is the "Public Portfolio" checkbox. Clicking "Public Portfolio" and "Save" would create a web address with your username (e.g., www.iwebfolio.com/public/user_name). 

If you have multiple portfolios created, you can still use the unique public URL provided by iWebfolio. Whenever a browser accesses the URL, an initial list of your public portfolios will be featured and the browser will have the option to select one or more of your public portfolios.

Embedding Web 2.0 Content

Web 2.0 content includes videos and presentations from websites like Google Docs, SlideShare.net, YouTube, and Vimeo. Using these Web 2.0 tools saves space in your iWebfolio account. Rather than linking a file in your e-portfolio, why not embed the media? 

You will need to have an account from any of the various sites mentioned above. You will need to follow each site’s procedures on uploading your content to these sites. For example, let’s say that you have a YouTube account and you want to embed the following video in your e-portfolio.

On the right side of the screen, you will see the box with the URL and Embed code. Highlight and copy the embed code. Note: with some of these sites, you have the option to customize the size and color of the materials you will embed.

Going into iWebfolio, go to the Items folder and click "create an item" (assuming you haven't created the item already in your portfolio). In the item editor, click "Source" to switch to the HTML editor mode. Then paste the embed code from YouTube in the edit area. 

Click the "Source" button again to switch back to the WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) mode.  After adding content and editing, click "Save and Return." Again, assuming that this is a new item created, you can then "attach" the item to the appropriate category in the e-portfolio. Here's a view of the embedded video. Below is a video demonstration for the Gateway to University Honors Class. 

YouTube is one of the many Web 2.0 tools you can embed in your e-portfolio. Rich Robles has used the following:

• Google Docs (for presentations)
• YouTube.com
• Vimeo.com (for HD movies)
• bubbl.us (for concept mapping)
• SlideShare.net (for presentations and documents)
• Scribd.com (for presentations and documents)
• TinyURL.com (for creating unique and memorable URL's)

Paste a MS Word Document Page as an Image

The following is a way for you to paste a MS Word file as an image in an iWebfolio page (item).  NOTE:  You will need a way to convert your MS Word file into an Adobe Acrobat format (PDF) file.

1. Within MS Word, save your file as a PDF
2. Open the PDF in Adobe Acrobat, then save it again as a JPEG
3. Within iWebfolio on your item (page), use the “insert image” function to insert the JPEG. Remember that, as with any file or image you use in your e-portfolio, you need to also upload the file to your account. You'll be prompted to do so when you use the "insert image" function -- you'll click "Browse Server" to identify the image in your account, and you can click "Add New File" to actually add the file to your account.