#BadgeChat was founded in December, 2014 by a group of educators who are passionate about credentialing learning and achieving. While there are thousands of us around the globe issuing badges to learners, there was not yet a regular twitter chat for those of us in the K-12 space to gather for learning and sharing about badging. After reaching out to leaders in the field (like the good folks at Mozilla and The Badge Alliance) for their thoughts, #BadgeChat was born.
I'm Noah in Denver. Community organizer of #BadgeChat and #BadgeSummit and easily excited about Digital Badge Credentials and their potential to change the world!
A1: I know #BadgeChat regular @Benjaroome has strong feelings about this on the quantity side and am interested for his take. Personally, I think it's more about MEANING...Is there *some* meaningfulness for *some* stakeholder? If so, it's not too much
Hi Open Badges community! I’m Kim with the Badgr team. Apologies for being a bit late today. A1: Our team believes in "badging the world”
Q1: Is there such a thing as “too much” badging? (aka "carpet badging” #BadgeChat
A1: It's the idea of something being overjustification. I think the key is to make them as concrete as possible and make sure they know WHY they earned it. It's an achievement of skill/mastery and not just a badge. #BadgeChat@SenorG
A1: There are poorly designed badges. Especially gamification type badges that are supposed to motivate (but don't). I've heard them referred to as "potty stickers." I think that's @szerge 's term. #badgechat
You can use tools to filter the internet down to the information you want to see. You can do the same for badges. What is important to one person or community may not be for others. #BadgeChat
I dig where you're going. To get concrete with an example, I picture Guinness records...even if it's a silly record for most consecutive high fives while on a pogo stick, it's an achievement and we can credential it and attach evidence. Am I close? #BadgeChat
You can use tools to filter the internet down to the information you want to see. You can do the same for badges. What is important to one person or community may not be for others. #BadgeChat
A2: Probably, yes. AND contor factor is not the Badge but the Issuer. Designers are wise to ask if they have create conditions for confusion.
Ex: In sports, Player of the Week honors doesn't take away from or dilute end of season awards like MVP #BadgeChat
Wow, love the unexpected direction you took this. The deteriorating value isn't just on the Consumer side but the Earner as well. Great point! #badgechat
A2: Copycat badges might reduce value and/or awarding to yourself without rigor attached.
Q2: What is the risk factor that some badges take away from the value of other badges? #BadgeChat
Yes, I think so. And also asking "Who is the person issuing the badges?" And "Who is the person designing the pathway?" If it's a learner, then even small badges can be very meaningful. #badgechat
Yes, I think so. And also asking "Who is the person issuing the badges?" And "Who is the person designing the pathway?" If it's a learner, then even small badges can be very meaningful. #badgechat
A2 When using badgesfor PD it is important to ensure badges aren’t just substitutions for CPE credits. Badges that are take away from the deeper purpose of others #BadgeChat
Hadn't even thought about this, Kim. By "copycat" are you referring to possibility that someone creates a fake version of a credential they don't deserve and try to pass it off as legit? #badgechat
A3: For me having a set of standards. I think a key factor to badging is in fairness and expectation. If the achiever loses faith, then the badge becomes meaningless. #BadgeChat@SenorG
A3: Y'all are making me rethink this! I'm leaning toward BOTH...
- Go by what earner (or other stakeholders) find meaningful as barometer
- Go by what works best for you
- Protect value proposition of some credentials by being selective of what gets into same club #BadgeChat
Kind of.. maybe a competing organization tries to undercut the value of the badges another organization is offering. Could be with different badges or combos of badges with less rigor than the prominent badge. #badgechat
A3 I believe they should be based on standards. BUT where/who establishes the standards can broaden the application of badges. #dontbadgejusttobadge#BadgeChat
Great points! When you think about those possible standards, from what institutional level should they come? Classroom? School? District? Community? State? Country? World???? #badgechat
You raise such an important point that we haven't addressed: one benefit of broadly accepted standards is broadly valued credentials that might open more/different doors #BadgeChat
CPE is usually based on input aka time spent in a training. The transfer & application of the training into practice is not considered. This is where CPEs fail. I believe badges should be based more on the output/application and less about input/seat time in training #badgechat
Holy #BadgeChat Badge Man, that went too fast! You smarties push and motivate me each week! Thanks for being here to all of the regular Badge Chatters, welcome back to the returnees and to the lurkers, we appreciate and value your form of active engagement! #badgechat
Thanks for the chat today @SenorG and #badgechat ppl - it was thought provoking and great fun. I’m worried about the "too much chocolate” statement tho. See you next week!
Ahhhhh, so ok to have *part* of value be CPE, just important to actually utilize badges as tools to credential actual learning and skills development, not just seat time. Love it! #badgechat
Takeaway:
When people say "too much" that might actually be a proxy for "not meaningful"...threat is not from quantity of badges but low quality of badges that don't carry meaning to stakeholders #BadgeChat
Great question! Badgr (@BadgrTeam) is a platform for issuing, earning and displaying Digital Badge Credentials. If you're wondering what those are, imagine if we credentialed language learners for demonstrated proficiencies of Can Do Statements...exciting stuff! #BadgeChat
A1 quality over quantity for determining how many badges. For Ss you can reuse badges year to year. For Ts need to continually develop new ones. #BadgeChat
A2 each badge brings an experience and value that will determine if learner continues to earn more. Too easy or too hard and the learner will move on. Successful egames get this. #BadgeChat
