Frequently Asked Questions
It is the York St John eportfolio tool. It allows students and staff to collect and present materials, resources, and to record experiences during the course of their studies.
The easiest way is to access Mahara through Moodle. Click on the Services tab in the top menu.
If you are asked to log in, use your York St John username and password.
By default, everything in Mahara is private except your Profile page which is visible to all York St John staff and students.
You can choose to share any pages or collections with other members of the university or even generate a secret URL if you need to share it with someone outside York St John.
A significant difference in the Mahara ePortfolio system is that it is learner centred – a form of Personal Learning Environment (PLE). This is in contrast to the more institution-centric Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). To this end, such technologies are often referred to as 'disruptive technologies', as the locus of control is shifted to the student.
It works as a user-centred, personalised learning space allowing the user to shape the way they present themselves to the world. Content and layout can be personalised to create multiple Views which meet the specific, differing or changing requirements of the user. This ties in with one of the key tenets of personalised learning, that students become key partners in the design of learning to suit their needs.
An ePortfolio has a much broader scope as an online collection of reflections and digital Artefacts (such as documents, images, blogs, resumés, multimedia, hyperlinks and contact information). Learners and staff can use an ePortfolio to demonstrate their learning, skills and development and record their achievements over time to a selected audience.
If you think of Moodle as the formal, structured side of e-learning, then Mahara is the social, reflective side. A VLE and an ePortfolio complement one another in an online learning environment.