FOREIGN LANGUAGE ANNALS * VOL. 38, NO.

1 69

An Electronic Portfolio for the

ACTFL/NCATE Teacher Program
Standards in the Second
Language Methods Course1
Stephanie Dhonau
University of Arkansas at Little Rock
Dave McAlpine
University of Arkunsas ut Little Rock

Abstract: With the publication of the ACTFLINCATE Program Standards for the Preparation of
Foreign Language Teachers in the fall of 2002, teacher preparation programs need to rethink the pro-
cess of gathering materials that best represent the abilities of the teacher candidates they are training.
This article discusses how oneforeign language program has piloted an archival process that requires
students to produce a CD-ROM as part of the second language methods course. The CD-ROM will
become a part of the total package presented during a K A T E accreditation review. Although the cre-
ation of the CD-ROM is ultimately for institutional review of its foreign language teacher education
program, it has also led to interactions among the foreign language faculty about the shared respon-
sibility for the preparation of teachers. Raising the barfor teacher candidates can only energizefac-
ulty to revisit expectationsfor all foreign language students. When all faculty members realize that
they are charged with graduating better-educated teacher candidates, the ACTFliNCATE Program
Standards will have accomplishedfar more than institutional accreditation.

Introduction
With the October 2002 publication of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign
Languages (ACTFL)/National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE)
Program Standards for the Preparation of Foreign Language Teachers and the April. 2002
Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL)/NCATE Standards for the
Accreditation of Initial Programs in P-12 ESL Teacher Education, methods instructors are chal-
lenged to incorporate the collection of measurable evidence of what foreigdsecond language
(L2) teacher candidates know and are able to do. Both sets of program standards expect demon-
stration of pedagogy and language proficiency from teacher candidates. This evidence must
become a part of L2 methods course requirements. These program standards set forth the nec-
essary elements for teacher preparation programs as well as the knowledge, skills, and disposi-
tions teacher candidates should demonstrate by the end of a L2 academic program (Kubota,
2003). Moreover, the International Society for Technology in Education’s (ISTE) National
Educational Technology Standards (NETS) (Gomez, 2000) challenge teacher educators to
require preservice teachers to archive a variety of examples of what they know and are able to
do with technology in the classroom. The NCATE requirements for the collection of artifacts and

Stephanie Dhonau (EdD, University of Arkansas at Little Rock) is Instructor of Second Language
Education at the University of Arkansas, Little Rock, Arkansas.

Dave McAlpine (EdD, University of South Dakota) is Professor of Spanish and Second Language
Education and Director of the Division of International and Second Language Studies at the
University of Arkansas, Little Rock, Arkansas.
70
CD-ROM PORTFOLIO REQUIREMENTS FROM COURSE SYLLABUS
Standards for Teachine Candidates:
As an institution accrcditcd by the National Council for
Accreditation of Tcachcr Education (NCATE), UALR courscs
that preparc tcachcrs for liccnsure adhcrc to thc national
teacher standards of the American Council on thc Teaching
of Foreign Languagcs (ACTFL) and of the Teachers of
English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL).
ACTFL Standards
Standard 1: Language. Linguistics, Coinparisons (1 .a, 1.c)
Standard 2: Cultures. Literatures, Cross-Disciplinary
Conccpts (2.a, 2.c)
Standard 3: Languagc Acquisition Thcorics and Instructional
Practices ( 3 3 , 3.b)
Standard 4: Intcgration of Standards into Curriculum and
Instruction (43, 4.b, 4.c)
Standard 5: Asscssmcnt of Languagcs and Cultures (5.a. 5.b)
Standard 6: Professionalism (6.a, 6.b)
TESOL Standards
Domain 1: Language ( 1.b)
Domain 2: Culture ( 2 4 2.b)
Domain 3: Planning and Managing Instruction (3.a, 3.b. 3.c)
Domain 4: Asscssmcnt (4.a, 4.b)
Domain 5: Profcssionalism (5.a, 5.c)
Assessment:
All material must be submitted in an electronic portfolio
(CD).
1. Microlessons: Each student will teach two (2) 10-minute
microlcssons to the class in the language of liccnsure or
cndorsemcnt. Evidence of the student's knowledgc of tcch-
nology is rcquired for each lesson. Each student will be
videotaped for your portfolio and must provide two ( 2 ) clean
30-minute mini-DV tapes for this purpose. A written rcflcc-
tion is due lor cach microlesson taught by the Wednesday
following thc Monday teaching experience. The reflection is
based on the microlesson rubric, peer evaluations, and in-
class discussion of your sample lesson. Students must use
the lesson plan available on the course Web page.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 1.2, l.c, 2.a. 2.c, 3 3 , 3.b. 4.a, 4.b,
4.c, 5.a, 5.b
TESOUNCATE Standards: l.b, 2.a, 2.b, 3.a, 3.b, 3.c, 4.a, 4.b
2. Thcrc will bc a final examination over each chapter of the
Omaggio Hadlcy [ 2000l text, the FUESL standards materials,
and your personal philosophy of teaching a second language.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 6.b
TESOVNCATE Standards: 5.c
SPRING 2005
3. The studcnt is rcyuircd to writc a total of four (4) cri-
tiques of readings from professional languagc journals/texts
(2) and from Internet rcsourccs (2). Thcsc critiques must be
typed and includc thc propcr bibliographic citation/URL.
The form you are to usc for this is available on thc class Web
page.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 6.a. 6.b
TESOUNCATE Standards: 5.a
4. The studcnt is requircd to evaluatc i n writing a current
sccond languagc textbook or scrics. An evaluation is avail-
able on the class Wcb page.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 3.13, 4.a. 4.b. 4.c
TESOUNCATE Standards: 3.c
5. The undergraduatc student is requircd t o compose a cur-
riculum vita and to writc an application lcttcr for a second
languagc tcaching position or a position where sccond lan-
guagc skills arc valuablc or ncetlcd.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 6.a.
TESOUNCATE Standards: 5.c
6. Thc studcnt is rcquired to write a samplc livc-skills tcst.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 5 4 5.b
TESOUNCATE Standards: 4.a, 4.b, 4.c
7. The graduatc student is requircd to apply to cithcr ACTFL
or TESOL for a conferencc-quality prcsentation on a subject
rclated to second language teaching. The proposal forni(s)
will be provided on the class Web page.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 6.a, 6.1)
TESOUNCATE Standards: 5.a. 5.b. 5.c
8. The student is required to subscribc to appropriate lan-
guage e-mail lists and to submit two (2) e-mail correspon-
dences about two different topics rclatcd to the coursc. Both
the question posed and one response to each question arc
required.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 6.a, 6b
TESOUNCATE Standards: 5.a, 5.b, 5.c
9. The student will attend cither thc state AFLTA or ARK-
TESOL conference in the spring.
ACTFUNCATE Standards: 6.a, 6.13
TESOUNCATE Standards: 5.a. 5.b. 5.c
 -
FOREIGN LANGUAGE ANNALS VOL. 38, N O . 1
I ACTFVNCATE PROGRAM STANDARDS FOR THE PREPARATION OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHERS
Standard 1: Language, Linguistics, Comparisons
Standard 2: Cultures, Literatures, Cross-DisciplinaryConcepts
Standard 3: Language Acquisition Theories and Instructional Practices
Standard 4: Integration of Standards into Curriculum and Instruction
Standard 5 : Assessment of Languages and Cultures
Standard 6: Professionalism
Source: ACTFL (2002)
the ISTE standards make it necessary to devise a method to
collect data demonstrating preservice achievement. The
authors of this article have approached this challenge by
turning to technology to assist with the collection of pre-
service artifacts. This article offers a rationale for the pro-
duction of a CD-ROM in the foreign languageEnglish-as-
a-second-language (ESL) methods course and discusses
the how-tos and caveats related to asking students to pro-
duce such a portfolio.
The Methods Portfolio
Traditionally, portfolios have been the domain of art,
music, and creative writing classes to name a few areas;
however, with the arrival of new digital media, it is appro-
priate to produce portfolios in all areas of performance
including L2 teacher training (Baird, 2003). In recent
years, alternative assessment of L2 learners has resulted in
the use of portfolios to monitor student performance and
second language acquisition (SLA) in the mainstream
classroom (O’Malley & Valdez Pierce, 1996). Moreover,
national foreign language and ESL student standards have
stressed the need to document what students know and
what students are able to do (National Standards, 1999,
TESOL, 1997). These new standards have essentially
required the profession to consider alternative ways to
assess student performance as they shift the focus from
what the language teacher does in the classroom to what
the student is able to do in the target language. As teacher
educators are in the process of training preservice teachers
on how to assess students, would it not be logical that pre-
service teachers experience this model in evaluation of
their own performance within the L2 methods course?
As 1 of the 562 NCATE-accredited teacher education
programs in the United States having just finished a suc-
cessful NCATE review under the previous process two
months prior to the adoption of the new NCATE teacher
standards, the Division of International and Second
Language Studies at the University of Arkansas at Little
Rock has the luxury of a five-year period to develop and
pilot processes for archiving teacher candidates’ accom-
plishments. In preparation for the production of a compre-
hensive portfolio by teacher candidates, it seemed prudent
to require the assembly of portfolio material to represent
71
the key concepts of the methods course reflecting the
ACTFUNCATE program standards (ACTFL, 20021, such
as: digital video teaching segments in at least two skills, the
accompanying lesson plans for the videos, a textbook eval-
uation, a five-skills test, evidence of professional develop-
ment through the critique of two articles and two Web
sites, as well as the creation of a curriculum vita and an
application letter for an L2 teaching position, a faux appli-
cation to be a presenter at either the national ACTFL or
TESOL conference and proof of attendance at a state lan-
guage conference. Additionally, the collection of these
materials requires teacher candidates to demonstrate tech-
nological competency achieved through the production of
an electronic portfolio in the form of a CD-ROM. The can-
didates’ CD-ROMs demonstrate the completion of nine
assessment activities. Table 1,excerpted from the methods
course syllabus, provides the content of the CD-ROM and
its relationship to the ACTFUNCATE and TESOUNCATE
program standards.
ACTFUNCATE Program Standards
Because the ACTFUNCATE program standards for the
preparation of foreign language teachers (ACTFL, 2002)
are new, a brief discussion of their content and what teach-
er candidates are expected to know and be able to do in
order to qualify for initial teacher licensure is relevant. See
Table 2.
Standards 1 and 2 are the domain of the foreign lan-
guage curriculum. This suggests that the emphasis on the
development of language and literary skills, both receptive
and productive, falls within the purview of the foreign lan-
guage faculty. There is a definite reflection of the students’
standards for foreign language learning in the 21st century
(National Standards, 1999) in that there is an expectation
that teacher candidates can meet interpersonal, interpre-
tive, and presentational modes of communication in the
foreign language at the Advanced level of the ACTFL Oral
Proficiency Guidelines (ACTFL, 1999). Also, teacher can-
didates need to know about and how to handle instruction
of comparisons of language systems, as well as theoretical
and sociolinguistic knowledge. Furthermore, candidates
must demonstrate understanding of the cultural three Ps
(products, practices, and perspectives). Literature faculty
72
STANDARDS FOR FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNING
Communication: Communicate in Languages Other Than English
Cultures: Gain Knowledge and Understanding of Other Cultures
Connections: Connect with Other Disciplines and Acquire Information
Comparisons: Develop Insight into the Nature of Language and Culture
Communities: Participate in Multilingual Communities at Home and Around the World
Source: National Standards (1999)
continue to play an important role in the preparation of
candidates’broad understanding of literary traditions of the
language. Finally, candidates must also see their language
development as a tool for interpreting other disciplines and
acquiring new information that can only be obtained
through the knowledge of another language. It is clear that
the ACTFUNCATE program standards are an intentional
reflection of the student standards, and thus add more sup-
port for the argument that the student standards are defi-
nitely applicable to the collegehniversity setting
(McAlpine, 2000).
The remaining four standards focus on the pedagogical
development of teacher candidates. Standard 3 requires
teacher candidates to know how and when language is
acquired for a variety of age groups whom they may teach
and to develop strategies to deliver instruction that reflects
the needs of these diverse learners. Standard 4 explicitly
asks the teacher candidates to incorporate the five Cs (see
Table 3) from the student standards into all aspects of their
own teaching in planning, instruction, and materials cre-
ation.
Standard 5 expects both that teacher candidates know
a variety of assessment models, and that they take time to
reflect on assessment and know how to report assessment
results to a variety of stakeholders. Standard 6 encourages
teacher candidates to become lifelong professionals by con-
tinuing to develop language and pedagogical skills beyond
initial licensure and also to become advocates for the field
of foreign language learning.
The teacher program standards, as well as the student
standards, form an integral part of the methods course. The
nine assessment activities forming the candidates’ electron-
ic portfolios (CD-ROM) reflect the standards as follows:
The two microlessons taught by each teacher candidate
are digitally recorded and serve as evidence that teacher can-
didates can demonstrate the expectations of Standards 1 and
2 because they directly ask the student to use the target lan-
guage at the Advanced-Low level while also incorporating
the target culture into the lesson plan. For Standard 3, the
candidates are required to evaluate an L2 textbook or series
and also to demonstrate the ability to instruct through the
microlesson. Both the microlesson and the lesson plan writ-
ten for the microlesson, as well as the creation of a five-skills
test, are examples of how candidates meet Standard 4 and
demonstrate knowledge of the five Cs of the student stan-
SPRING 2005
dards. Moreover, both the design of the five-skills test and
microlessons provide evidence that teacher candidates can
create appropriate multiple assessment measurements as
described in Standard 5. As part of the final examination,
teacher candidates are required to provide a personal phi-
losophy of teaching an L2; furthermore, teacher candidates
are asked to critique Internet and journal articles, to write a
cumculum vita and letter of application for an L2 teaching
position, to post questions to L2 listservs, to submit a mock
abstract for a national L2 conference, and to attend a state
L2 conference. These six assessment activities represent a
significant amount of time devoted to the development of
the professionalism of L2 teacher candidates as expected in
Standard 6.
With knowledge of the six standards in mind, foreign
language faculty must begin discussions on the content of
a more fully-developed CD-ROM representing the six stan-
dards. In the methods course described in this article, the
CD-ROMs produced by teacher candidates attempted to
reflect only Standards 3 ,4 , 5, and 6. Whereas, Standards 1
and 2 are the purview of the foreign language and literature
faculty, the methods faculty at the University of Arkansas at
Little Rock concentrated on assessing pedagogical develop-
ment reflected in Standards 3 , 4 , 5, and 6.
Benefits of the Electronic Portfolio
to Teacher Candidates
The CD-ROM benefits both the teacher candidates and the
program. Although the piloting of the production of CD-
ROMs for the L2 methods course has developed out of a
need to demonstrate teacher candidate competency, there
are numerous benefits beyond accreditation to be gleaned
from the process.
Requiring students to create the CD-ROM for the L2
methods course is only a part of what becomes a larger
portfolio representing the teacher candidates’ performance
related to ACTFUNCATE Standards 1 and 2 in which they
archive samples of language, literature, and culture. The
CD-ROM allows teacher candidates to maintain artifacts
from one of many courses taken during the foreign lan-
guage program. The combination of the language, litera-
ture, and culture artifacts from Standards l and 2 and the
pedagogical artifacts from Standards 3 , 4 , 5 , and 6 will later
form a final electronic portfolio demonstrating growth
across time.
FOREIGN LANGUAGE ANNALS * VOL. 38, NO. 1
While teacher candidates collect artifacts for the
course, they are required to develop their technological
competence as described by the ISTE standards that
include “a sound understanding of technology operations
and concepts,” demonstrate that they “plan and design
effective learning environments and experiences supported
by technology,” and “use technology to enhance their pro-
ductivity and professional practice” (Gomez, 2000).
During the course, teacher candidates are required to teach
microlessons using digital technology (such as PowerPoint
2000 presentations to enhance these lessons). The produc-
tion of the CD-ROM itself requires the students to under-
stand operations including uploading digital video, scan-
ning material, emailing to listservs, and burning the elec-
tronic portfolio. Completion of the electronic portfolio in
the methods course is a definite step in the right direction
for meeting the ISTE standards.
By becoming aware of teacher candidate standards
during the methods course, students who collect artifacts
for the ACTFUNCATE program standards review begin to
understand the external world of accreditation. The expe-
rience of becoming familiar with the ACTFUNCATE pro-
gram standards serves teacher candidates well should they
choose to apply for National Board Certification or to work
with other accrediting programs in future careers.
Attempting to meet the ACTFUNCATE program standards
raises the bar for teacher candidate performance and asks
teacher candidates to perform at a level comparable to
other professional fields. The experience of creating an
electronic portfolio while in the teacher training program
prepares teacher candidates for a life of external assessment
that has become a part of the culture of accountability and
assessment in education.
If one models the use of portfolio assessment with the
preservice teachers, it is hoped they will consider portfolio
assessment in addition to traditional pencil-and-paper tests
(Gomez, 2000). In fact, the use of a portfolio is more
aligned with the expectations of the National Standards
(1999) than any other assessment method because the stu-
dent standards have shifted away from knowledge about
language to what a student knows and is able to do with
language.
The ultimate benefit for the students is the impressive
representation of their work to prospective employers.
Most employers assume that a student will come to a job
interview with a paper resume along with a letter of appli-
cation. This CD-ROM contains samples of teaching mini-
lessons on digital video with accompanying written lesson
plans, reviews of professional materials, and textbook
reviews. The CD-ROM not only shows an employer the
standard credentials expected of teacher candidates, but
also allows the candidates to stand out among other appli-
cants. Teacher candidates can produce multiple copies of
the CD-ROM at a very low cost. Therefore, the electronic
73
portfolio serves as an electronic calling card containing
more detailed information than ever before on potential
candidates.
Benefits of the Electronic Portfolio for the
L2 Teacher Education Program
Just as there are considerable benefits to students who have
collected the artifacts for the electronic portfolio, so too are
there benefits for foreign language programs as a whole.
Because ACTFUNCATE reviews member institutions
every five years, the CD-ROM allows for easy management
of teacher candidate materials. An ACTFIINCATE program
standards review is now required of all institutions that are
seeking accreditation of their foreign language education
programs as of 2003 (ACTFL, 2002). Prior to 2003, pro-
grams that trained foreign language teachers did not have to
prepare specialized professional association (SPA) reports
and materials for the NCATE review process, as this was
subsumed under the general NCATE institutional review of
teacher education programs. The CD-ROM highlights the
integration of good teaching practices rather than just a
regurgitation of language teaching and learning theory as
this was the case prior to the emphasis on student stan-
dards. The importance of NCATE accreditation should not
be underestimated; for some institutions, NCATE approval
is necessary for the entire university to continue to train
teachers. It would be unfortunate for a foreign language pre-
service teacher education program to be a part of an institu-
tion’s failure to become initially accredited or reaccredited.
Across the nation, program accountability is finding its
way into all aspects of the university community in com-
parable ways to that of K-12 education. The creation of a
culture of assessment logically leads to new and alternative
ways of assessing teacher candidate work, allowing for the
CD-ROM to be an appropriate method of assessing perfor-
mance. The CD-ROM is easily revised, accommodates the
new technologies affecting the field of education, and is
easily archived for later use. The production of the CD-
ROM in the methods course helps to serve as evidence for
the ACTFUNCATE program standards review process as
mentioned previously, but also serves as evidence for pro-
gram assessment within the foreign language department
as a whole. The CD-ROM provides more evidence of pro-
ductive language skills and points out to language instruc-
tors the strengths and weaknesses of student performance
so they can realign their curriculum to better meet the
needs of foreign language teacher candidates, as well as all
foreign language majors and minors.
Just as campuswide assessment is pervasive, so too are
discussions of technological competence across campus.
Often discussions are centered on incorporating a course in
technology into an already crowded undergraduate cur-
riculum. Having departmental expectations for foreign lan-
guage students to demonstrate technological ability via
74
CD-ROM eliminates the need for such an addition.
Moreover, a side benefit for foreign language teacher candi-
dates is to focus on technology within the field of foreign
language learning and teaching rather than on a general
across-the-board technology mandate.
Those who have attempted to archive student work
prior to ACTFUNCATE program standards requirements
will know how difficult it is to preserve and store the tradi-
tional paper portfolios. Physical space limitations in facul-
ty offices prevent satisfactory storage of artifacts that must
be kept for a period of several years; likewise, it is not man-
ageable for students to retain paper materials for future
review. The CD-ROM allows for multiple copies to be made
at low cost for faculty, students, and ACTFUNCATE pro-
gram standards review. By archiving student work onto CD-
ROMs, the archival material may be sent electronically to
external ACTFUNCATE program standards reviewers any-
where in the world. Moreover, having numerous copies of
CD-ROMs allows faculty to show teacher candidates exam-
ples of best practices from former candidates.
In many institutions, the training of teachers is left to
the College of Education or to one individual in a foreign
language department. However, with the approval of the
ACTFUN CATE program standards, teacher candidate
preparation is a shared responsibility among all faculty
members who come into contact with foreign language stu-
dents. Of all the requirements for obtaining
ACTFUNCATE accreditation, the most challenging one
may be bringing all faculty to the realization that the shap-
ing of a “fully formed foreign language professional” is the
responsibility of all. When faculty members realize that
they are each charged with producing better-educated
SPRING ZOOS
teacher candidates, the ACTFUNCATE program standards
will have accomplished far more than institutional accredi-
tation. The CD-ROM can be the unifyng factor as faculty
from language, literature, culture, and pedagogy come
together to discuss which artifacts best represent candi-
dates’ abilities.
Collecting and Burning the CD-ROM:
Processes and Procedures
As mentioned previously, the L2 methods course is princi-
pally responsible for preparing students to meet
ACTFUNCATE program standards 3,4, 5, and 6 .
At the beginning of the course, it is especially impor-
tant to tell students that the final evaluation will be based
on the production of the electronic portfolio that archives
performance. Likewise, the course syllabus states that by
remaining in the course, the student gives permission to be
videotaped when teaching two 10-minute minilessons.
Students must purchase two separate mini-DV tapes to be
presented to the course instructors prior to their mini-
lesson presentation. In order to avoid the chaos of 20 or
more students attempting to produce two videotapes for a
semester-long course, the course instructors choose to do
the videotaping of the candidates’ lessons. This provides
organization and keeps the class on task. Two tapes are
required to avoid the possibility of taping over the first
minilesson and having to queue up the tape for the second
minilesson. These lessons are later converted to a digital
format such as QuickTime or Realplayer movies, and are
burned onto the CD-ROM (Dhonau & McAlpine, 2002).
Because this was the first time the instructors have
asked for the electronic portfolio as the final product of the
course, the instructors burned a sample CD-ROM and
showed it to the participants well in advance of the end of
the course. Students received some instruction on types of
software used (e.g., Word 2000 documents, PowerPoint
2000 presentations, file scanning formats, and digital film-
ing); however, the expectation was that students would
find the appropriate technology center on campus to get
technical support. The sample (see Figure 1) illustrates the
required components.
Before the beginning of the semester, the instructors
visited the computer lab whose purpose is to serve the
needs of teacher candidates on the campus. It is wise to
alert the computer staff on the campus that students will
want to use their facility for this project, well in advance of
the assignment. The hours of the lab and what services are
available to students are important to share during the first
meeting of the course.
As various course requirements were discussed, the
instructors reminded candidates throughout the semester
of the need to archive materials for the final portfolio and
suggested the format in which they might collect the
archived evidence.
FOREIGN LANGUAGE ANNALS * VOL. 38, N O . 1
Caveats
It is no surprise that if one chooses to pursue such a project,
and even if one has spent extensive time during the course
discussing the electronic portfolio and demonstrating sam-
ples, there will not be 100% success with the production of
the CD-ROMs. Because the authors chose not to interfere
with the actual production of the CD-ROM, allowing stu-
dents flexibility for burning all the required files onto the
CD-ROM, some of the CD-ROMs contained files that were
unreadable by either Macs or PCs. One of the most signifi-
cant challenges can be coping with unreadable files. A
course instructor should standardize the file format as
much as possible for word processing, scanned documents,
and digital video in the syllabus well in advance of the port-
folio deadline. It is suggested that a student with a com-
pleted electronic portfolio test the CD on another comput-
er to check if it contains unreadable files.
A second challenge comes from the demands of the
digital video production. Several students found that their
10-minute video was consuming over 1 gigabyte (GB) of
space and would not fit onto a standard 800 megabyte
(MB) CD-ROM. Although these large videos were of
extremely high quality; for purposes of artifact collection,
it was not necessary to use a format that consumes so
much disk space. More compressed video allows for ample
disk space for other artifacts. Students are encouraged to
use simple compression programs, such as iMovie for
Macintosh computers (2001) or other similar software. For
example, a 10-minute video rendered using iMovie con-
sumed only 32 MB of space on an 800 MB CD-ROM, while
those who attempted to use Adobe Premier in its highest
quality setting, found the same 10-minute video would
take up more than one 800 MB CD-ROM (Dhonau 65
McAlpine, 2002). Again, standardizing the digital format
and the quality level of the videos for the electronic portfo-
lio is important at the start of the course.
Finally, if methods instructors wish to have students
produce electronic portfolios, instructors need to approach
the project with flexibility and to be prepared to accept that
software, hardware, and technical support may fail during
the process. One may need to consider allowing students to
turn in the traditional paper copy of course requirements
should any of the technology fail, with the idea that one
will attempt to solve the technical issues prior to the next
iteration of the course. Since this is a major cultural shift in
the way L2 teacher training has been done, it is important
to persevere and challenge teacher candidates and faculty,
despite some of the technical risks.
Future Considerations and Questions
Within the scope of the methods course, the piloted elec-
tronic portfolio represents a first step in the attempt to
capture teacher candidates’ foreign language teaching
performance for the purposes of accreditation. Due to the
75
rigorous demands of the ACTFUNCATE program stan-
dards, the production of a comprehensive electronic port-
folio can be a critical artifact for showing the develop-
ment of teacher candidates’ language and pedagogical
growth. The convenience of having an entire “history” of
what teacher candidates know and are able to do in one
package is an asset for both the student and the depart-
ment that has to present its candidates for
ACTFUNCATE program standards review.
What has been discussed in this article is a suggested
way of archiving student evidence from one pedagogy
course for ACTFLlNCATE program review. It is important
to note that the new ACTFUNCATE program standards
are written to engage all foreign language faculty members
in the preparation of foreign language teacher candidates.
N o longer is the preparation of teachers only the domain of
the teacher education faculty, whether within a College of
Education or within a foreign language department; it is
now incumbent upon all faculty to understand the impli-
cations and ramifications of these new standards.
After having instituted the creation of a CD-ROM in
the methods course, several questions still remain. At what
point do we expect students to begin the process of col-
lecting artifacts? How does one get representative samples
of foreign language growth across time? With large num-
bers of students taking foreign language requirements, how
does one balance the quantity of work that Spanish faculty
members might devote to this process as compared with
colleagues in other languages with lower enrollments?
How does one convince colleagues, who entered depart-
ments to teach literature, to engage in the process of
preparing teachers?
At the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, answers
to these questions are being addressed through the assis-
tance of a grant obtained from the Arkansas Department of
Higher Education through the No Child Left Behind Act
(NCLB) to begin a study of the implementation of the
ACTFUNCATE program standards throughout the foreign
language curriculum, including the language, literature,
and culture courses. University faculty and public school
faculty are coming together over the course of a year to
study both the foreign language student standards and the
ACTFUNCATE program standards in order to ask and
hopefully answer some of these questions presented here
in preparation for the next review which will occur under
the new standards.
Conclusion
Energizing the entire L2 faculty to study the curriculum
that forms the complete education of teacher candidates
can only help raise internal standards for a department.
Moreover, by raising the bar for teacher education candi-
dates, the bar will be raised for all L2 students. The collec-
tion of evidence from all students, not only for those
76
preparing to be teachers, may only strengthen the quality of
all graduates from a foreign language program. Having
piloted the CD-ROM in the methods course leads these
authors to conclude that the archiving of materials in this
manner is the method in which all six ACTFUNCATE pro-
gram standards should be evaluated. The electronic portfo-
lio may be the most logical way for L2 teacher candidates
to present what they know about language, literatures, and
cultures, and what they are able to do with this knowledge
in the classroom, as well as how well the department has
done in preparing teacher candidates.
Notes
1. Since the review and acceptance of this article, NCATE has
changed the reporting of the program review to a Web-based
format. This new format asks for seven to eight assessments,
scoring guides or criteria, and supporting data that demon-
strate that standards are being met be submitted via the
Internet. However, the authors of this article feel that the pro-
cess of creating an electronic portfolio is still valuable and will
serve as a resource for those who are responsible for the sub-
mission of the ACTFMCATE Program review. Likewise, the
portfolios can be made available to the onsite NCATE review
team in the documents room on campus.
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