“New Forms of Engagement”
In terms of creativity, a device is only going to aid in creativity and will only be as creative as the person using it. If a person only uses and sees their device as something to play games and check social media on, then that device will probably only be used for a small number of creative purposes. However, devices can be used for so much more than that. Users can create and edit photos and videos, share information through the use of social media, blogs, and wikis, and can interact with people and places via a digital interface. Additionally, anything that a person can create on their phone can be shared online or with other individuals. I feel that mobile devices can harness all of the above and tie it into education. The only limitations would be the creativity of the instructor and the meaningfulness of how these functions are applied.
Badges in Education
Before reading these two articles about badges, I had never heard of them before or thought I hadn’t. This is an instance where a component of video games is trying to cross the divide to become integrated into an educational setting. Badges are essentially like getting a certificate of achievement for completing some type of task or a certain amount of work. The basis for earning a badge is decided by the person or people who are giving them out. The reason I mentioned video games is that this sounds just like the achievement systems used by certain video games when a task or goal is completed. I kept thinking of earning achievements in World of Warcraft and noticed it was a very similar system to badges.
In the first article I read, An Online Badging System Supporting Educators’ STEM Learning, discussed using badges in conjunction with professional development. Honestly, I didn’t see how this would be beneficial myself, other than showing an administrator that you were doing your PD work. If I were given this same opportunity to learn about my subject area I wouldn’t really care about the badges unless they were useful for something outside of the PD itself. This sentiment was described in more detail in the second article I read, titled: Digital badges in afterschool learning: Documenting the perspectives and experiences of students and educators. Badges were used to show students that they had achieved something or learned something, but when interviewed, many of the students either didn’t know what they were or didn’t understand why they were supposed to be important. I agree with the discussion in the article that badges would be useful if students could use them to show colleges or potential employers that they had obtained a particular skill set that would set them apart in some way and make them a more appealing candidate. However, because this wasn’t the case, students didn’t find the value in them. I would also agree that a larger system would need to be in place for something like that the work. There is no way for a separate institution from the one issuing the badge to tell if the badge is a good quality attribute or not. To quote one person interviewed from the program issuing the badges, “…it’s going to be hard for people to sort you know, crap from good stuff.”
If I were to use badges in my classroom, I would use them one of two ways. One, I would tie them into a positive reward system. For example, if a student earned a badge in something, they could earn a ticket for a prize raffle or some other token in a token economy. Or two, I could use badges as they were mentioned in the first article I read, as being used for evaluation. Earning badges could be a way to show that they have learned a certain skill or completed a task and that in turn could be their key to progressing in a course. Rather than having me administer an assessment and then decide if they should move on to a new topic, students could digitally earn badges and move through the course material on their own. I have always wanted to create a classroom setup that allowed students to choose their own art projects and content and proceed through a course, however, I didn’t have a good plan in mind for how to monitor their progress other than when they turned in an assignment. Badges would provide me with a good way to check in on students and see their progress at a glance, rather than having to manually check on their progress.
Augmented Reality
Augmented reality gives students the opportunity to interact with an assignment by means of virtual reality. It provides students with an authentic and engaging experience that is open-ended and provides the opportunity to use problem-solving and exploratory skills. The article talks about the pros of this type of learning being: 1:1 interaction, working with multiple perspectives, and high engagement and motivation. Cons were: cognitive overload, incompatibility with standards-based school cultures, and technical problems. This was a very introductory article that placed a lot of emphasis on theories behind using AR in the classroom rather than instances where it was used in practice. For my own content area, I have only read about one instance of AR for art. This was in the form of a field trip to a museum that uses an app where students can take a photo of a work of art and the app tells them information about that work. Otherwise, while I’m sure there are many places in the art curriculum that AR would be useful, I haven’t seen or heard or any other instances of it in practice. This makes me wonder is AR lends itself more to certain fields than others.
- Davis, K., & Singh, S. (2015). Digital badges in afterschool learning: Documenting the perspectives and experiences of students and educators. Computers & Education, 88, 72–83.
- Dunleavy, M., & Dede, C. (2014). Augmented reality teaching and learning. In J. M. Spector, M. D. Merrill, J. Elen, & M. J. Bishop (Eds.), Handbook of research on educational communications and technology(pp. 735-745). New York, NY: Springer.
- Gamrat, C., & Zimmerman, H. (2015). An online badging system supporting educators’ STEM learning. In D. Hickey, J. Jovanović, S. Lonn, & J. E. Willis (Eds.), Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Open Badges in Education Co-located With the 5th International Learning Analytics and Knowledge Conference (LAK 2015)(pp. 12–23). CEUR Workshop Proceedings, Poughkeepsie.
- Klopfer, Eric. (2012). New Forms of Engagement [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=691&v=_UHA9XYAXjA