**5. Discussion and conclusion**

Findings indicate that despite any prior experiences, pre-service ESL teachers perceived e-portfolios as a useful mediator tool to develop a CoP. They employed e-portfolios as the platform to reveal their voices, argue with their individual opinions, encourage others' works and outlooks, and provided suggestion for implication. Initially they took creating e-portfolios as an issue of enjoyable initiative. After becoming familiar with it they started to realize that e-portfolios could be a suitable platform to express their different ideas and individual opinions on an issue which they were not able to apprise in a face-to-face classroom where time and scope are limited. As such, these issues (domains) guided them to organize their knowledge and reflect on that. It helped them sort out what to share, how to distinguish trivial idea and which one had real promise. Such practice dictated them to develop a community within the participants. That is, domain denoted the topic participants focused on, the practice is the specific knowledge the community develops and shares. With the help of the shared practices participants were able to develop a commitment about its use in their future job. Wenger, McDermott and Snyder [29] claim that such commitment make a distinction between a community and just a group of friends. Hence, the pre-service teachers in this study have developed a community of practice and functioned and contributed meaningfully to the causes of their online community, particularly in terms of sharing knowledge.

Findings also reveal that pre-service ESL teachers positively considered e-portfolios as a meaningful tool for the enhancement of competencies. However, similar to the previous studies relating to the pre-service teacher's language [18] and ICT development [16] participants of this study were also feeling frustrated at the beginning due to unfamiliarity with the tasks, later, after becoming confident to deal with, e-portfolios facilitated their development and growth in those areas. This study also corroborates the potentials of e-portfolios to develop an interactive environment for the enhancement of writing skill [30], stimulation of communication skill [16], online collaborative learning [31, 32]. Shy students who felt hesitate to participate in a face-to-face classroom, found it as more suitable way for learning English [18]. It enhanced their insights on drawbacks of traditional paper-pencil tests and developing awareness about the alternative assessment system like e-portfolio. Hence, not surprisingly, most of the participant became aware that this type of tool can contribute to enhancing the teachers' quality in Malaysian, and, therefore, felt motivated to utilize it in their future job. Such psychological advantage may assist them to foster a sense of pride on their personal work and feeling of satisfaction [33]. Such kind of positive feelings is crucial since the use of e-portfolios in educational settings is not a common practice in Malaysia.

Besides this worthwhile and fulfilling learning experience, there are a few drawbacks that need to be addressed. The most damaging issue, if left unattended to is the issue of Internet connection. For the e-portfolios to be successfully implemented, the Internet connection must be available to the participants, fast, consistent, and reliable. Notably, the issue of the online platform is crucial for the successful e-portfolio implementation. Stefani, Masson and Pegler [8] describe four types of commonly used online platform for e-portfolios (1) commercial software (2) institutional (3) open-source e-portfolio software and (4) open-source common tools. This study used open-source e-portfolio software as the online platform. However, each of these options has few pros and cons [8]. Hence, determination is required which type of online platform is more suitable in Malaysian context in line with the expense, participants' capability, and their necessity.

Another concern that was voiced by the participants is the need for a structured and comprehensive training on how to create e-portfolios. Indeed, training is required, since creating e-portfolios is described in literature as a 'daunting job' (Barrett, 2001 cited in [34]) or not a 'simple undertaking' [35]. But before that, policy makers need to take a methodical and organized planning how and for what purposes e-portfolios will be implemented, such as product/ process/showcase, long term/short term (k-12, pre-service, in service), voluntarily/mandatorily, formal accreditation/ informal documentation, institutionally or else as a whole. After addressing such questions training can be arranged to ensure its systematic use. Careful planning is also crucial as the lack of time [36] and redesigning of course objectives in line with the e-portfolios [8] are two seriously hindering factor that could jeopardize the whole initiative. Most importantly, despite ample promise e-portfolios sometimes ends with "limited success" due to "lack of stickiness" ([37], p. xxxiii). Hence, regular updating is imperative to reap the actual benefits from e-portfolios. Course instructors' role is vital in this regard. They are required to provide 'quality and quantity support' ([32], p. 1139) through frequent interaction, recognizing the strengths and weaknesses of individuals, encouraging to constructive use, monitoring participation, and providing formative suggestions.

This study reveals that meaningful utilization of e-portfolios in pre-service teacher education may confer additional dimensions in the efforts of contemporary web-based language learning in Malaysia. It can be a useful tool to enhance ICT competencies, delivering linguistic exercises, access authentic materials, communication, carry out projects, share opinions and ideas, and work in collaborative and co-operative ways among others. However, this study was limited within a narrow context and does not allow for a generalization of findings. But this study provided an important contribution to the literature on e-portfolio since it synthesized the baseline understandings on the issues of pre-service ESL teachers' perceptions toward e-portfolios and how it contributed to their development and growth in a context like Malaysia where using e-portfolio is not a widespread practice. The methodology used in this study can also provide insight to motivate and coach teachers to become more reflective and active participants in their learning processes. Developing countries like Malaysia who are intending to persuade e-portfolios in educational settings may get an insight from this study.

However, it could be noted that, for an extensive implementation such baseline understanding is not sufficient since a lot of issues remained unanswered in this study. New technologies are constantly changing and influence the way we learn and teach. Teachers' capacities to deal with such change, learn from it, and help students learn from it are critical for the future development of societies. Hence, teacher education programs need to adapt the rapid changes of new technologies and stay aligned with contemporary era. Otherwise, such recent technologies may itself create barrier in teachers' development, instead of making them capable. Further research and experimentation in TESOL as well as other contexts and disciplines is required to examine its feasibility and implement process from different views to establish it as a new pedagogical and technological fad in the developing countries as well as in Malaysian context. Since, the present efforts of the governments, in general, are confined to the quality in education, findings from the study may assist the policymakers to initiate necessary steps to reconsider and modify the conventional practices of teaching-learning and assessment. Teacher training institutions can also implement e-portfolios in line with the specific needs in a local context or as a part of certification in not only pre-service but also in-service teacher education.

*Reflection of Pre-Service ESL Teachers on Using e-Portfolio in Teacher Education DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.100158*
