Badge good or badge bad?

Young discusses how badges can be used to show time spent working on a particular project. Although, I like the idea of motivating students with something other than a final grade. I doubt the fact that badges will ever take over the credibility of a college degree or grades on a transcript. Badges can be small motivators for pacing a student and keeping them on track for the next goal that they must complete, but in the end, no amount of time spent will change the ability to complete the desired task. Thomas Edison made thousands of mistakes before inventing the light bulb. However, a badge for time spent with no end result doesn’t put him in the history books.

In the video, badges were described as a record of achievement. After hearing this and seeing the online icons, I remembered that a program that I use with my freshmen in American Government, that is based on online, uses badges to reward them for adequate/superior performance on a gaming program. Students are asked to categorized, match and experiment with different branches and topics in the government. At the end of each game, they are presented with some kind of badge. Sometimes, its the “You did it!” badge.  Other times, it’s the “Keep up the hard work!” badge. After reading and listening to experts on badges in the field of education, I’ll be interested to do some of my own research on what badges the students feel are most desired.

 

2 thoughts on “Badge good or badge bad?

  1. cnb135 Post author

    Cheryl – The website is called icivics.org. I highly recommend at least making it a place to visit when you are online some time.
    If the minimum standard was not met, students were allowed to continue to work on the process until it was completed. The number of tries was set at unlimited and they worked until proficient. Feedback was direct to what the students were missing in the activity.

    (PS: If you visit icivics.org, check out the games. These are what I am referencing!)

  2. Cheryl Burris

    You stated, “.. I remembered that a program that I use with my freshmen in American Government, that is based on online, uses badges to reward them for adequate/superior performance on a gaming program.”

    I have two questions:
    1. What happened if the students did not achieve the minimum standard required to obtain the badge?
    2. Was the feedback just empty encouraging messages or did it contain feedback of some form? I have never done something like this before but I have to wonder if feedback, which I think is an important part of learning, is included.

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