E-portfolios for Teachers' Development

Language and literature are interrelated entities and can facilitate language learners’ development. But, pre-service ESL teachers in Malaysia who came across this initiative were lacking several competencies. E-portfolio has become a frequent topic of discussion to foster tangible development over time, however, was never been explored in Malaysia. Hence, this study was initiated focusing on three core issues; ESL teachers’ perception, its contributions and challenges of creating e-portfolios. 55 teachers participated who were majoring in TESOL at Universiti Sains Malaysia. As a course-requirement, participants created e-portfolios, posted weekly journals and reflected on those. Both qualitative and quantitative data reveal that despite of initial agony participants perceived e-portfolio as useful for development in different folds including content knowledge, effective classroom practice, linguistic ability and other competencies. Besides, few challenges were reported that can hinder its extensive exercise. This study has generated several theoretical, practical and methodological implications, however, wider implementation requires further experimentation in other contexts.