And that's not the end of it. How do you then share these and organise them in a way so that you and your students can get to them. I use blogger (linked to box), Blendspace (linked to Dropbox and Google drive) and sometimes other tools (for example Linoit) to create portals to a collection of resources. It's what you might call a Personal Learning Environment ( PLE or a series of PLEs) or, to be honest, a Personal Teaching Environment but that's a phrase I have just coined. Most colleges use Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) such as Moodle as their baseline portals and some use ONLY VLEs.
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To use these tools create an e-portfolio you will need to decide whether you will be using the system as an individual or more corporately. You should also ensure that your institution is aware of what you are doing and how and why you are doing it! You will also need to think carefully about what is going to be in the portfolios. There have been some fears over data protection so make sure students are storing 'effort' and not personal data and keep up with ongoing agreements. Google stored stuff does (I understand) sit within EU data protection legislation (wherever it is stored) so there shouldn't be any issues there. For my part, I have not experienced any concerns or issues. Why different systems?
What you use may be a consequence of nothing more than familiarity or aesthetics. It may be that the variations in functionality suit your needs. It may be that a particular system works better with the way your institutional network is organised. Whatever you choose to use, PLEASE trial it first before fully committing. Below are a few pointers.
Storage
There are loads of different online storage options and there's no reason a similar system shouldn't work with Dropbox or Skydrive for example. I did also set one up in Moodle but found that the time needed to guide and support students in its use was too much.
Google Drive
Pros
- collaborating is easiest of all the systems I have tried
- immediate and real time updating means more than one can edit same document simultaneously
- encourages cloud storage in general and sits snugly with other productivity apps such as 'read/ write for Google'
Cons
- doesn't look quite as nice as Box when embedded
- editing in Google Drive means some people feel that the formatting options are limited (compared to MS office)
- needs Chrome or something other than IE to work properly
Box.com
Pros
- (arguable!) uses MS Word and other office tools as editing tools
- collaborators can exchange comments in a very user friendly interface on Box
- presentation and overall look and feel is excellent
- embedding easy and looks great
- If you don't want constant formative feedback and just want final documents to upload and IV/EV it is probably the easiest
Cons
- editing in MS products means you have to download to edit and have the Box edit software on your machine
- takes some students some time to 'conceptualise' where the document is and how to edit it!
