Timelines are everywhere, they are present in (educational) apps and have become a staple in many tools. But what about Portflow?
We recently released the first version of our own timeline: A dedicated timeline for each Portflow goal. All events and activities related to a goal can now be found in one overview to get an easier and better understanding of how a student is working on a goal. The timeline also makes it easier to navigate and access relevant goal content.
The portfolio owner has a timeline for each goal. As a timeline is part of a goal, it’s visible to others if the goal is shared. If an entire portfolio is shared, the invited feedback provider has access to all goals including their timelines. If only one collection is shared, the feedback giver only has access to the timeline(s) of the goal(s) within the respective collection.
Why the goal timeline could be interesting for you
Regardless of your role or how often you work with goals, the timeline can be an interesting feature to provide new insights. Below is a list of benefits of working with the goal timeline:
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- One simple overview
Whether you are a coach, a feedback provider, or a student, it can sometimes be challenging to keep a clear overview of goals, related collections and related evidence. The timeline combines all those contexts and presents them in one chronological view. To keep this view as simple as possible, you’ll find we don’t present all content at once, but instead only show the most relevant items, and make secondary information expandable or visitable. In addition, one can filter the timeline by content types. - Audit trail
Activities and events such as a change in the status of the goal, linked collections, added or removed evidence and new or removed versions are all reflected in the timeline. Each timeline item contains a date stamp. This way, both the student and the coach are able to track all changes related to a goal. - New goal insights
The timeline can provide insight into the progress of a goal. For example, the amount of events/activities can say something about the effort put into achieving a goal. If a goal status is changed to ‘On hold’ or if there’s a large gap between activities, it can indicate a student is struggling with a specific goal.Moreover, if the student sees that the timeline of one goal contains far fewer events and activities than the timelines of other goals, it may motivate the student to pay more attention to that particular goal.
- One simple overview
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What is next for the goal timeline?
The goal timeline in its current shape is only the beginning. Further enrichments of the timeline with more events and activities (e.g. changes in goal details, progress reviews and goal related comments) is something we are envisioning for future developments.