WikiSkills Handbook/Badges

What is a badge ? What for ?
Digital badges are a validated indicator of accomplishment, skill, quality or interest that can be earned in various learning environments.

Digital badges are employed in a variety of ways. Badges can serve different functions depending on the activities with which they are associated. Commonly, badges are thought of as rewards but have been found to be most effective when they also contribute to goal setting, reputation, status affirmation, instruction and group identification. Badges also promote lifelong learning that extends beyond the classroom and brings to light accomplishments that otherwise might have been hidden.

Benefits associated with digital badges include the ability to capture the complete learning path, so it “travels” with the user wherever they decide to display the badge. The digital badge carries with it information about assessment, evidence and other metadata required by the badge. Digital badges can signal achievement to potential employers; motivate engagement and collaboration; improve retention and leveling up in learning; support innovation and flexibility in the skills that matter; and build and formalize identity and reputation within learning communities.

Badges as motivation to participate
One of the ways in which badges are often used is to encourage participation by recognizing the participants. Motivation is often one of the major reasons designers decide to employ badges. Participation is encouraged because badges offer a new pathway of lifelong learning separate from the traditional, formalized academic pathway. Badges highlight and recognize skills and knowledge that come from personal initiative and investigation.

Badges as motivation to collaborate
Unlike most online media, open badge programs are collaborative ones that promote active, engaged involvement. While there are several modes of online collective action, all of the systems are largely run by a very small number of people. Given more collaboration by an increased number of people, even more solutions, ideas and theories could be presented and analyzed. Badges have the potential to work for any company or online collaborative action system in order to engage more people and motivate those people to participate in online data sharing and social media.

Badges “enhance identity and reputation, raising profiles within learning communities and among peers by aggregating identities across other communities... [and] build community and social capital by helping learners find peers and mentors with similar interests. Community badges help formalize camaraderie, team synthesis, and communities of practice". Badges quantify the soft skills of teamwork that are pivotal to success in many professions today.

Badges as recognition and assessment
Sometimes digital badges are used to recognize quality or provide for community approval. Open Badges allows you to represent, verify and communicate your skills, interests and achievements, and because the system is based on an open standard, you can combine multiple badges from different issuers to tell the complete story of your achievements.

In learning environments, badges have been used to encourage alternative, peer-based assessment. Badges can be associated with summative assessments of prior learning as well as formative assessment that provide guidance and feedback. They can also function as transformative assessment that shape existing learning or allow new ones to be created. Digital badges might be particularly useful as part of a formative assessment process, providing constant feedback and tracking of what has been learned and what the next step might be. Massive online open courses (MOOCs) and e-assessments, can be used to deliver content at scale, while providing structured points for formative assessment, connections to learning communities, and new possibilities for strengthening individual agency in the learning process. Such environments might leverage self- and peer-assessment, again as part of formative processes.

Badges as alternative credentials
Digital badges have been seen as a potential challenger to the dominant paradigm of diplomas in higher education.

Additionally, digital badges can be used as competency-based signifier of achievement, which is in contrast to traditional educational models that stress time-based quantification of education goals. Digital badges also have the ability to be more nimble than school curriculum that take time to create, change, and evolve.

To read more about digital badges : Digital_badge

Wikinomics badges
Wikinomics is a well established socioeconomic term. This handbook draws from the ongoing work of the Wikinomics project in order to revisit the term’s definition and demonstrate innovative collaborative and educative approaches, including sustainable network building and open badges use scenario. This includes launching an open communication process with the Open Badges initiatives and a specific methodology to connect the project’s learning outcomes with the ECVET framework approach.

Have a look on the following video for more background on how these badges were created: Revisiting the Wikinomics concept: towards new methodological approaches from the 1st International Workshop on Open Badges in Education (#OBIE2014) in conjunction with the 13th International Conference on Web-based Learning (ICWL2014), Tallinn, Estonia, 14-17 August 2014

Access to the Open Badges Plateform here : Get your open badges

How to create your own WikiNomics badges ?
Some digital badge platforms allow organizations to create, issue, earn and display digital badges on members’ websites, social media pages, and resumes. Several attempts have been made to aggregate the digital badges found on multiple sites. For example, Basno and the Mozilla Open Badge Infrastructure seeks to create an open set of standards for representing and exchanging badges across the web.

To create your own Wikinomics badges :
 * A general canvas to design the badge : http://www.wikinomics-project.eu/wp-content/uploads//Open-Badge-Canvas-general.pdf
 * User and admin guide to the Openbadges platform : http://www.wikinomics-project.eu/wp-content/uploads//ManagingOpenBadgesfortheWikinomicscommunity.pdf