Using Adobe Acrobat to Create Student Portfolios
Today I attended on online workshop sponsored by NMC on using Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro to create student portfolios. Acrobat 9 has templates that allow students to gather their content together whether it be word docs, QT movies, photos, 3D images, animations, etc., into one concise document that can display the contents in a professional-looking portfolio that only requires the Adobe Acrobat Reader to view. Most portfolios tend to be a list of links to different types of media, while Acrobat portfolios have a consistent look to the interface.
After launching Acrobat 9 Pro, simply choose Create PDF Portfolio from the File menu and choose a basic layout from the list on the right. There is a basic grid layout, a layout that has a photo background, a revolving content layout (similar to iTunes in a way), and a sliding row of content.
Other options below the layout include adding a Welcome and Header, selecting a color scheme, specifying file details, and publishing.
To create a header for your portfolio, click the Add Welcome & Header button. You can either add a Welcome Page to introduce your portfolio, or a Header, which can consist of logos, images, and text. Clicking either of these choices will reveal more options for what you may want to include, such as Text Only, Image Only, Image & Text, or a Flash movie.
You can choose a color from the color palette for your portfolio or create your own color scheme.
After choosing a layout, simply drag your content to the main content window to begin asembling your portfolio. Once you're done adding content just save your portfolio to create the PDF document. It couldn't be simpler.
Since this creates a PDF document, this can be shared using iTunes U to take advantage of class rosters for viewing rights. If the student's instructor has Acrobat Pro 9, they can also download and edit the individual files in the portfolio and place them back into the portfolio. This might be a way to create interesting assignments in addition to portfolios. If we can find a way to export content from our blogs, this might also be a way of capturing content from people who leave the university.
Adobe also offers acrobat online at http://www.acrobat.com
The site gives you free access to create up to 5 PDFs per month online, the ability to share your desktop with another person via Connect, Buzzword, which is a cool Word doc type online application for collaborating on document creation, and a file-sharing application, and storage for up to 5 Gigs of files in an online organizer. It's worth checking out.
ITS Training Services offered a half day workshop by Adobe's Steve Adler on Acrobat 9's portfolio capabilities. Neat stuff.
Yes, this was pretty cool. I was unable to make that training session, so I was glad that NMC provided this presentation.
BTW, NMC has begun an online seminar series entitled "Adobe First Mondays", and this was the first presentation in that series. It is done using Connect and phone line and was recorded for later playback. I'll try to get the URL when it becomes available.
Monthly sessions begin at 2PM our time and are available at:
https://admin.na3.acrobat.com/_a748449443/adobemondays/
You can enter as a Guest.
The archived presentation can be viewed here:
https://admin.na3.acrobat.com/_a748449443/p44732496/
Great writeup. I wasn't able to make the session, but your notes will help (plus the link to the recording).