Category: #openbadges

What next for Open Badges?

Blockchain, the underlying technology used by Bitcoin, is cool. At least, I think it is, if I could only get my head around it. A group of thinkers (including Serge Ravet) from the Open Badges Community got together to start thinking about how the Open Badge standard could be used inside the Blockchain. What would…
Choosing a badging system

With any solution there are often three different approaches: bespoke, modular and off-the-shelf. Choosing the most appropriate path is more difficult than it seems. This is certainly true of selecting a Badging system. There’s also value in learning through trying multiple approaches at the same time, and assuming that as a result unseen requirements and…
Badge Platform Questions

A while ago, Doug Belshaw and I were working on the #OB101 course, in order to help others think about OpenBadges and how to dip their toes in the water. Some of this thinking relates to a discussion at the Badge Alliance community call about some OpenBadge platforms not really being open. So what should you…
Badge Taxonomy V0.2

This is version two of the Badge Taxonomy – the purpose of which is not to classify rogue badges – but to understand how badges were being used, and help think through badging solutions.
3DCV

I really liked this idea from the Education Design Lab blog post Are Badges College Ready?. What would a 3D CV look like? What might elevate one achievement over another? Open Badges provide the underlying mechanism, but the value of a badge depends on multiple factors.
Prescriptive vs Descriptive Pathways

It took me a while to come up with this pathways metaphor, following a conversation with @dajbelshaw – oddly enough the idea popped into my head right in the middle of a meeting, while talking about other stuff.
#OB101

Need to know more about OpenBadges? Check out #OB101…
The Badge Cycle

This is a generic version of the badge cycle visual thought I created for the BBC. In it I’m trying to bring to life the process of earning and issuing badges. It was included as part of the FELTAG report.
A certificate is just an offline badge

When thinking about Open Badges, its easy to get stuck on the paper certificate paradigm and think about why an Open Badge isn’t that. Here’s is a thought from Chris Kirk and Doug Belshaw, emanating from an excellent dinner conversation, which looks at a certificate from the perspective of a badge.
Soft skills aren’t so soft

I liked this thought about "soft" skills by Beverley Oliver, at #epforall Barcelona Indeed, as Scott Wilson commented, they are hard to define, hard to acquire, hard to assess, hard to evidence – there’s very little that’s soft about them…
The T-shaped Student

I met some excellent people from JISC at the EPIC conference in Barcelona (2015). Simon Whittemore discussed using Open Badges to help create and recognise “T-shaped” students. I really like the thought of a broad compliment of skills and attitudes across a number of domains, coupled with an expertise and competence in one particular domain.
Levelling the Playing Field

This is a thought inspired by the Open Badges conference organised by @szerge in Barcelona recently. I am increasingly aware of how privileged I am, and how easy it is to accept the state of the playing field as just “how it is” as opposed to questioning it’s unfairness, and doing something about it. An…