Friday, September 1, 2017

Badges FTW!

Last year when I was completing my Apple Teacher certification, I was a little addicted to the badges. Not sure why, but I was.  Same with the Apple Watch...especially the special badges that only exist on certain days, like the National Park Challenge.  I wondered if my kids would be as geeked out about badges as I was so at the end of last year, I tried it out using Schoology's badging system.

At first I thought they would laugh and blow it off, but I was very wrong.  Their interest in the badges was quite hilarious.  We invented random badges like "Class Shhh-er" and "Winner Winner Chicken Dinner".  They continually asked when the next badge was going to be up for grabs so I started using some that were a little more challenging.  I used a badge called Coder to try to convince them to use coding for a class project.  I did a SMASH badge for kids who app smashed a project.  

The end of the year feedback was so positive, I knew I needed to continue this year with the badges. Here are mine so far -  I printed this out and had kids use it to keep up with their badge collection on paper as well as in Schoology. I would love to know what badges you use and how you use them in your classes. 



Yesterday I posted an update to Schoology 10 minutes before school was out to see if anyone wanted to earn their clean up badge by helping me take down a super messy lab we did.  Eight kids showed up  - EIGHT!  I had six more reply and ask if there would be another opportunity for that badge because they had practice after school.

I love trying new things in the classroom and seeing kids engaged.  As silly as most think badges are, it makes my kids laugh and get excited - so its totally worth it.

Special thanks to my friend Mrs. Perkins for the ideas on some of these badges! :)

5 comments:

  1. So fun to teach with you! Firm Badges to Busting barriers your passion for the kids is evident in all you do!

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  2. This is so cool!! Do you use a rubric to score for the badges? or do you have a system for how they get each one?

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    1. No rubric -they either get it or not -- most badges or challenges or for fun -- I always tell them ahead of time that there is an opportunity for a badge...I love using them! Its funny how much they like them. Now if Schoology would just let them been seen in the APP!! :)

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  3. Would you be willing to share your badges? I've been trying to create some and the images are too big and it is becoming frustrating? Thank you.

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  4. How do you manage to get your pictures to fit? I've tried resizing, searching for small images, etc. and they still get cut off when creating them in Schoology. So frustrating!

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