Learning is an active process that can be facilitated though the use of student academic products. Academic products include quizzes, tests, papers, participation, presentations, and class projects.  In today’s digitally connected world, student products no longer need to be solely based on traditional papers and other written work.  The ability of various digital platforms for documentation and presentation of student work allows increased flexibility and creativity for both the teacher and the student.  A number of faculty, programs, and courses have been experimenting with a simple, easy to learn and use, electronic presentation tool, KEEP Toolkit. 

KEEP Toolkit was developed, by The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching Knowledge Media Lab (KML), as a free open-source web-based presentation tool.  It was launched in 2002 as part of the CASTL Carnegie Scholars project (http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/programs/index.asp?key=21) as a means to document faculty work. It quickly became an international tool for the documentation of faculty scholarship and as a tool for facilitating student learning in a variety of classes.  Currently there are over 100,000 snapshots on the KML from more than 30,000 KML registered users representing every type of educational institution nationally and internationally.   Snapshots are the digital product that the user produces.  You are encouraged to visit the KEEP Toolkit sites and spend some time browsing to see the many uses and institutions that that have adopted this tool.

The University of Maryland was one of the first universities to receive a site license allowing the tool to be hosted locally.  The UMD KEEP Toolkit site (http://www.keep.umd.edu/static/index.html) is a minor image of the site at the Carnegie Foundation KML (http://www.cfkeep.org/static/index.html). The UMD site requires you to login using your LDAP University ID and does not allow self-registration.  To obtain a UMD KEEP Toolkit account you need to contact us at CTE.

As one of the original six Carnegie Scholars who were the faculty guinea pigs who tested the concept and tool in its earliest days, I immediately saw the great potential this tool has as a simple but powerful teaching device for all types of classes.  The attributes that make this tool so useful include the following: 

• It requires no knowledge of digital languages or codes beyond using a word-processor and understanding how to find a file on a local drive and upload it to the site.  On numerous occasions I have been able to teach faculty how to use KEEP Toolkit in 20 minutes, and they have had their first snapshot up within a couple of hours.  For students, it is generally sufficient to simply provide the proper URL and explain how to login. Their familiarity with commercial media like Facebook and Myspace has provided adequate training to allow them to immediately navigate and use KEEP Toolkit. 
• KEEP Toolkit handles all digital media including text, PDF files, HTML code, audio files, and video files. 
• It uses a Dashboard interface, which provides the user with a simple, easy to understand, menu set for the various functions. 
• It is adaptable and flexible and as such can be used for presentation of student projects, step-wise development for student learning of a specific task (e.g., a lab report, poster, etc.) and can be adapted for use as a simple portfolio tool to track and document student learning/development within a course or program of study. 
• It is secure in that the author controls the level of access to her/his materials, from being only visible to the author to publication with a choice of copyright on the Internet.  Another useful feature is that the snapshot can be sent as a read-only file to anyone via email or can be shared as modifiable file with others on the same KEEP Toolkit site. 

One of the most useful features for course use is that the instructor can predetermine a template that lays out the format and content for assigned student work.  This helps to ensure a level of consistency and uniformity across student products and greatly facilitates grading of student work.  When the template is coupled with a grading rubric both students and faculty have a clear understanding of expectations. 

A second useful feature is the ability to connect (stitch) individual student snapshots together, thus providing a temporal archive of student or product development.  For example, one of my colleagues in a large (>200 students) microbiology lab course used KEEP Toolkit to document student learning during a semester-long research project.  By requiring three snapshots she was able to provide a lot of structure via the template for the first snapshot, less structure for the second snapshot, and allow the students to decide how the third and final snapshot should be structured.  In using this ramping-up of student input she not only helped students to learn the presentation expectations of the discipline of Microbiology she empowered them and provide a concrete mechanism by which she and they could see their own intellectual development.  The gallery tool allows the instructor to assemble class works into a gallery that enables one to easily navigate and view student works from a given class as a single organizing snapshot.

Currently there are more than 500 students and faculty with UMD KEEP Toolkit accounts.  On campus the KEEP Toolkit has been employed in both graduate and undergraduate courses, from introductory to upper and found uses ranging from a simple portfolio tool to a means of documenting student engagement and work in several of the College Park Scholars learning communities.  The feedback on KEEP Toolkit from both faculty and students is positive and generally both groups find the tool fun, easy to use, and useful.  If you are interested in exploring whether KEEP Toolkit might be a useful pedagogical tool for your class, contact CTE. Alternatively, watch for the call for applications for the 2008 CTE Summer Technology Institute, which CTE will host in late May.  We will release the call for applicants later this semester.

 By Spencer Benson
Director of CTE