PebblePad - not just an eportfolio

About PebblePad

PebblePad Presentation Video
PebblePad Downloadable Presentations
PebblePad Overview - a narrated PowerPoint (5 mins)

PebblePad has been designed to three key tenets: advanced functionality, maximum flexibility and simple usability. For ePortfolios to attain their potential it is essential that systems are as inviting, usable and beneficial as possible otherwise users will only develop their ePortfolios as part of a directed regime. Reaction from both users and observers to the ‘look and feel’ of PebblePad has been extremely generous.

PebblePad is unusual because it is a generic system; it has been developed to support and celebrate all forms of learning; to facilitate transition between stages of learning, and transition to employment: it places control of the ePortfolio firmly in the hands of the learner - whilst allowing for authentic and reliable assessment by the teacher.

Most other ePortfolio systems are designed for specific users in specific contexts and so prescribe certain activities, certain forms of evidence and certain activities for learners: therefore their ability to support transitional or lifelong learning can be contested. Unlike PebblePad, context specific ePortfolio systems can require considerable setup and maintenance for each new group of users.

PebblePad is based on the idea that we each learn many different things in different places and at different times. A typical student may record a meeting with their personal tutor in the morning; create a research action plan for a module in the afternoon and reflect on their part-time volunteering later in the evening. PebblePad allows for considerable diversity of use; it provides no internal pathway, route or programme to limit how it can be used. Subject guides, module assessments and personal/professional development programmes are easily tailored to include ePortfolio activities and, importantly, these changes are made by teachers familiar with their own and their students’ needs.