Engaging Students in Online Education: Evaluating the Use of Badges in an Undergraduate Research Course

Background and Purpose:

The use of digital badges is an emerging trend in education to increase student participation and engagement in online and face-to-face classes. Badges are used to motivate students to complete tasks and assignments, assess learning, and add gaming elements. While some literature exists discussing the use of badges in other disciplines, little empirical evidence exists on the effectiveness of badges, particularly in social work education. As more and more social work programs move to implement online instruction on the BSW and MSW level, innovative techniques are required to keep up with student expectations in content delivery and meet competency requirements through engagement and mastery. This presentation discusses the implementation and outcomes associated with using badges as a way to motivate students to complete content in an undergraduate research methods course.

The current study has the following objectives:

1. Determine whether or not there is a correlation between completion of badges and performance on learning assessments and a significant difference in final grades.
2. Explore common characteristics of students who complete badges as opposed to those who do not.

Methods:

This presentation reviews data collected over two semesters from three sections of an online undergraduate Introduction to Research Methods course (N=51).  Learning modules within the course were designed with several required and optional assignments. Students who completed the entire modules (including optional assignments) were awarded a digital badge reflecting the content topic (i.e. Ethics, Measurement, Group Designs, Qualitative Methods, etc.). Students were awarded two extra credit points for each badge completed up to a total of 20 points.  Courses are identical in format and content and taught by the same instructor.  Data was collected on number of badges completed, exam and final scores, as well as student characteristics such as age, gender and GPA.

Results:

Analysis were computed via SPSS to determine whether or not there was a correlation between completion of badges and final grades, and to determine if there were differences in final grades depending on the number of badges completed. A Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient indicated a significant positive correlation between number of badges completed and final scores (controlling for extra credit points), r = .28, n = 50, p = .049. In addition there was a significant difference in final scores between students who completed 5 or more badges (>50%) (M = 264.86, SD = 22.56) and those that completed less that 5 badges (M = 248.43, SD = 30.87), t(41) = 1.981, p = .054 (among students who completed badges).

Conclusions and Implications:

Digital badges are a novel and innovative approach for motivating and engaging students in online environments. This study suggests that there is empirical evidence to support an emerging positive correlation between completion of badges and final scores in addition to differences between final course scores dependent on the number of badges completed. This preliminary data adds to the knowledge base of evidence-based education and indicates the need for continued exploration in to the use of badges.