Abstract:

To demonstrate students’ advance in learning, digital course badges visualize the focal areas of a course and its parameters. As organizational research suggests, the success of implementing such a pedagogical innovation depends on different individual and institutional characteristics that influence the perceived benefits for students and faculty. However, literature on experiences with implementing digital course badges seems somewhat spare. Considering both perspectives of students and instructors as important organizational stakeholders, we thus report on key findings of an evaluation study we have conducted at our university. The objective was to explore and contrast main uses and associated stakeholder perceptions (e.g., lecturers’ intention to use course badges in the future) regarding a pilot course badge version that we made available to interested lecturers. They primarily used them in the following ways: They put the badge on the learning management system for students to use, shared it on social media and showed it in-class during the course. In this context, and in line with the Technology Acceptance Model, perceived ease of use is a critical factor for using course badges as a teaching tool in the future. In terms of further course badge development opportunities, this paper concludes with a classificatory overview that assigns identified benefits and pitfalls to general key functions of course badges in university environments (Representation, Organization, Interpretation, Transformation, Decoration and Signalling). For instance, according to its transformative function, a course badge provides personal orientation and supports decision-making. From the instructors’ perspective, it can highlight innovative course characteristics where oversimplification by forced choice of what is to be visualized might be a risk. We consider these and further results as a first step towards a more generic classification to systemize the overall role of badges in higher education. Accordingly, we refer to potentials for future research and related implications for lifelong learning.

Keywords:

Higher Education, Digital Badges, Knowledge Visualization, Lifelong Learning, Pedagogical Innovation, Technology Adoption.