Technological Aids to the Efficient Assessment of Prior Learning - E-Infrastructures and Technologies for Lifelong Learning - page 328

Portfolio Template portfolios for assessment purposes, candidates

should be provided with a portfolio template. This
template should guide candidates to (a) gather
relevant evidence, (b) present the evidence in a
structured self-explanatory manner, and (c) self-
assess their competences based on the selected
evidence and the competence profiles. By using
hyperlinks the candidate is electronically guided
through the template (see Figure 2 for an example
of an interactive portfolio template. The use of
hyperlinks in word-documents is a simple way
to guide learners in their portfolio construction.
A more sophisticated way to guide learners
through a portfolio might be the use of support
systems. These systems use an interactive dialogue
to compose the important information in the
portfolio.
To gather relevant evidence, the template could
provide a checklist of relevant contexts in which
competences could have been developed by the
candidate, including informal and non-formal

The diversity of evidences in e-portfolios makes
the assessment of portfolios for APL a complex
task for assessors. Moreover, the APL is influ-
enced by the ability of candidates to construct a
well structured e-portfolio with relevant artefacts
and by the assessors' ability to objectively assess
the competence level based on the content of the
portfolio. The high competence level of a candidate
might not stand out due to an ill-structured portfo-
lio with badly selected artefacts or ill-developed
ict-skills, or the assessor can be prone to base his
assessment on subjective arguments. It is thus
important that both the candidate and the assessor
are supported in the use of an e-portfolio for APL
(Kicken, 2008; McMullan et al., 2003). A port-
folio template can support candidates to prepare
their portfolio for the APL procedure. To support
candidates in the construction of their e-portfolio
and to structure the diversity of evidence in the

Figure 2. Example of an interactive portfolio template