Why Open Badges are important for the CoderDojo community.

What are they?

Digital badges are becoming a popular way to acknowledge digital skills achieved by attendees at Dojos. They are an online representation of skills you have obtained. They are almost like a digital Scouts badge which are awarded once someone reaches a certain level or learns a particular skill.

Open badges allow you to verify your skills, interests and achievements through credible organisations whether online or off. Multiple achievements can be recorded on a single badge and can be displayed anywhere on the web. You can share them for many different reasons such as employment or education. They are a great method of validating digital skills which aren’t always very visible.

CoderDojo want to use open badges as a way to give recognition to attendees of Dojos who have achieved great things. We want them to become more regularly used so as to create a system of appreciation for Ninjas which they can display proudly and continue to add to the more they learn.

We have previously used Mozilla Open Badges such as the ‘Skill Sharer – EU Code Week’ digital badge which was awarded to CoderDojo community members who shared their knowledge with others during Code Week last year.

Current Badges available to the community

We currently have “Official CoderDojo” badges available on the new CoderDojo Platform. These have been made easily accessible and have clear instructions so that mentors and parents can help CoderDojo Ninjas acquire badges once they have completes a specific task. Dojos are also able to create and distribute their own badges for specific awards they find relevant via the community platform.

The CoderDojo Foundation also provide badges that have been created and approved within the Community Platform. These types of badges can be linked to a number of events or just to one specific event depending on what is needed. The badges are compatible with the Mozilla Open Badge standard so they can be moved out to other backpack and used on other sites as well.

Read more about open badges here.