Högskolan i Skövde

Courses given by Swedish Universities are part of work integrated learning and a way to lifelong learning possible for a broad share of the workforce. Obstacles for successful participation are difficulties in onboarding, retention and completion of courses, which in many cases are caused by motivational issues and insufficient goal setting. The learner needs to be assisted by some clues in how to best navigate the individual learning journey and how to find the learning activities in order to reach personal milestones and goals in the lifelong pathways of learning (Gibson et al., 2016).

The objective of this presentation is to improve the understanding on how to adopt the concepts of digital open badges and learning paths and how to benefit from the motivational and relational aspects of digital micro-credentials. Workplace learning can gain a number of advantages by using digital open badges (Palmquist, 2023). Organizational support for guiding the learner in the right direction is an important factor for workplace learning participation. Digital open badges can serve as a way to give directions on the paths through a course curriculum as well as a means for monitoring the learners' credits.

Collecting digital open badges is a way to keep track of what activities have been undertaken by a learner, given that there are existing badges to earn in the activities and events. In the learning environment of an organization like a company, a governmental organization or a university there is a great need for staff development activities in the workplace. By forming a system of microcredits with open digital badges as a token there is a way to make learners more aware and perhaps also more motivated to participate in those activities. Letting the badges earned track the activities will serve as an electronic collection of tokens to record the learners' achievements and merits.

Rosenberger (2019) found that five areas of focus are employed by instructional designers creating digital badge programs: iterative design, piloting, participant feedback, incorporating communicative elements about the utility of digital badges in the program, and adopting high-touch or hands-on approaches.

The design process for a badging scheme has been researched in a course development project called WISER. The method used was a qualitative study combined with action research. The findings suggest that organizations need to care for social contexts for learning, build a sense of community and nourish soft skills like communication and collaboration. Motivation to participate in activities and to share knowledge while improving work processes, product quality and services can be promoted by implementing a well-designed system of digital badges. Initiation of reflective practices, mentoring and coaching the individual employees, supporting and guiding competency development processes and strengthening trust for the common cause of the organization are all important tasks. The perception of the concepts of digital open badges and learning paths have been evaluated and stakeholders show great interest in the improvements of motivation, reflection and guidance.

References:

Gibson, D., Coleman, K., & Irving, L. (2016). Learning Journeys in Higher Education: Designing Digital Pathways Badges for Learning, Motivation and Assessment. In D. Ifenthaler, N. Bellin-Mularski, & D.-K. Mah (Eds.), Foundation of Digital Badges and Micro-Credentials: Demonstrating and Recognizing Knowledge and Competencies (pp. 115–138). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15425-1_7

Palmquist, A. (2023). Plug & Play? Stakeholders Co-meaningmaking of Gamification Implementations in Workplace Learning Environments. Doctoral thesis. University of Gothenburg.

Rosenberger, K. (2019). Designing Digital Badging Programs: Findings from an Interview-Based Study with Instructional Designers. TechTrends, 63(4), 477–484. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-018-0349-7