Workflow tool to efficiently collect, grade, and return student work
Community Review for eBackpack
My Take
Overall, this is a useful tool that allows students to submit work and receive feedback in a streamlined, efficient way.
It can be a bit glitchy, but it is worth using considering how much it improves organization and workflow.
How I Use It
Students in my class submit a large quantity of their written work through eBackpack. When they are finished with an assignment (e.g. a writing assignment), they submit a PDF of the document through eBackpack into a folder I have created. Submissions are timestamped. I can grade and annotate their assignments in eBackpack, adding typed notes, handwritten notes, digital post-its, and highlights. Once I have completed annotations, I can give the assignment its final grade and return it to students, where they will see it in their graded work folder.
This works well as a streamlining tool to simplify the workflow and reduce the amount of paper collected. Students have a permanent copy of their graded work, and they can resubmit revisions when needed.
The drawbacks of eBackpack over traditional paper grading are that you need to be connected to the Internet (offline mode has not been reliable), and there is sometimes lag time when you write comments. I have also had annotations disappear, which can be very frustrating. The drawback of eBackpack over something like Google docs is that you don't have a record of revisions and changes.