How To Start Using Badges?

Content

Many people are excited about the idea of open badges but often are not sure where to start. Here are some essential steps towards using open badges.
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Source: Project 'Digital Generation Youth', Youtube channel of Cities of Learning﻿
Download the video script here. 
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Step 1. Identify the reason you want to use open badges. Perhaps you want to make the outcomes of your educational programme more visible? Or you are looking for ways to connect your participants with some external organisations looking for people with certain skills? Or you wish to show learning pathways in a clearer manner? Badges can be a good solution to such challenges.
 
Step 2. Identify more specific goals you wish to achieve with badges. Some objectives might be linked to making your educational process better – to onboard or motivate your learners with badges or establish a more transparent assessment flow. Other objectives can be linked to achievements and recognition to support building badge-based portfolios or establishing endorsement agreements with other organisations.
 
Step 3. Reach an agreement in your organisation on using badges and make sure people gain the necessary understanding and skills to integrate them in their programmes. Consider involving your partners or potential badge endorsers at a certain point. They can give you valuable ideas or build a foundation for a wider recognition of the skills acquired through your programmes.
 
Step 4. Now analyse your educational programme and identify how you want your learners to be different by the end of the journey. Identify some key milestones and some possible challenges on the way. Don’t forget to involve your potential badge earners – they can tell you where some extra motivation is needed, where recognition is missing or what should be highlighted. It will help to identify where and what kind of badges shall be added to the learning journey.
 
Step 5. Start describing a few badges: think of a name, then add a description, criteria, assessment methods and the type of evidence required. Think of a possible image design and what badges should communicate visually.
 
Step 6. Now think how your learners will learn about badges and how they will access them. Should they do it on their own? Or should an educator present badges? It’s important to consider different ways of inviting people to earn a badge. You can present a badge to your programme participants in several ways:
by showing a QR code. People can scan it and see the badge description and criteria – what they need to do to earn the badge;
by sharing a link. It is helpful if you communicate with programme participants on an online platform or through a chat service;
by sending an invitation by email. Programme participants will receive a notification that they are invited to earn a badge.
 
Step 7. Together with your badge earners explore how to make the most of badges. Where to share them online? Who should see badges? Who might be interested in skills represented by badges? Should people share every single badge or an entire portfolio or a certificate of badges? Talk through different opportunities that may open up when people leave a positive and data-rich digital footstep.
 
Open badges have been used for years, and a wealth of experience has been accumulated. Join the badging community in your country or contact partners already using badges. They might give you some valuable tips on how to create and use badges in your programme.
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Badge ObjectivesNow you know that Open Badges can serve for a variety of purposes. It is up to your organisation, project and context to identify the specific issue or challenge that badges will help to address. 
It won't solve all world problems, but surely badges can be helpful in assessment, recognition and motivation of learning. 
Here we would like to share a set of cards, giving you plenty of ideas what badges and badge systems can be used for. Cards were created as part of the Design Principles Documentation Project. 
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The DPD Project studied the 30 Open Badges initiatives from the 2012 DML Badges Competition, supported by the MacArthur Foundation and came up with this set of cards, giving you ideas for more than 30 Badge objectives within 4 areas: 
Recognition of learning
Assessing learning 
Motivating learning
Studying and Research of learning
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Please download the instructions on how to use the cards here: DPD-Project-Cards-Handout.pdf﻿
And download the entire set of cards here: DPD-card-deck.pdf﻿
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You can print these using both sides printing or just simply use the PDF version.  Here is the preview of what you can find inside of the file.
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When exploring all these DPD cards, reflect on which objectives for open badges would you choose first for your badge? 
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Resources

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Badge Starter Get this badge

This badge is the evidence of my increased understanding of main steps how to stat using badges and what might be objectives for the badge systems that I am creating. 
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To earn this badge, I had to provide several answers about reasons and objectives of using Open badges and ways I would start using badges in my context. 
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This badge is issued as a part of the online course leading to the achievement of the Badge Quality Label.  
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You have to finish 1 task to get the badge

Tasks

Task no.1

Evidence verified by: one activity organiser

Option A. Choose this task if you did not use Open badges in the past. 
Share your answers to those few questions. You can also write your answers in the document and upload it here as an evidence:   
Why do you wish to use digital Open Badges? What are key objectives? 
Whom you would deem important to involve in creating a badging programme? 
What is the expected change? How do you want your learners to be different by the end of the badging journey? Identify some key milestones and some possible challenges on the way.
How your learners will learn about badges, and how they will access them? 
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Task no.2

Evidence verified by: one activity organiser

Option B. If you are already implementing badges, then it will be easy, just answer these few questions so we would better understand your badging context. 
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Share your answers to those few questions below. You can also write your answers in the document and upload it here as an evidence.   
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1. Why are you using Open Badges? What were the initial obkectives of your badge system? 
2. What are the key elements and moments in the programme, which are signposted or recognised by Open Badges? 
3. How are your badge earners getting badges? 
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Time to complete: 1 hour

Organisers

Network of Cities and Regions of Learning

Badgecraft hosts this platform and develops it together with leading educational organisations. The European Union's programme Erasmus+ granted co-funding for building the first version of this platform. Contact support@badgecraft.eu.