GRASS – Open Badges for Grading Soft Skills Funded with support from the European Commission, within project Grading soft skills: GRASS, No. 543029-LLP-1-RS-KA3-KA3MP GRASS – Open Badges for Grading Soft Skills Dr Niall Seery Dr Donal Canty This communication reflects the views only of authors, and the commission cannot be held responsible for any use, which may be made of the information contained therein.

EU LLP Project Grading Soft Skills (GRASS) is a 3-year research project financially supported by EU focusing on representing soft skills of learners of various ages and at different levels of education in a quantitative, measurable way, so that these skills can become the subject of formal validation and recognition. The project is being developed with the support of the Lifelong Learning Programme (LLP) of the EU, the flagship European funding programme in the field of education and training.

Aim https://sites.google.com/site/llpgrassproject/ The overall aim of this project is to create mechanisms that enable to continuously support, monitor, assess, and acknowledge development of learners' soft skills with the help of state-of-the- art ICT tools. https://sites.google.com/site/llpgrassproject/

Objectives Novel pedagogical approaches Incorporate pedagogy in daily practices Multiple levels of education Rich, structured set of soft skills metrics New model and ICT framework Mechanisms for acknowledging, grading and awarding learners' soft skills Incentive policies for teachers

Partners Serbia: Sweden: Croatia: Ireland: University of Belgrade (UB) First Grammar School of Kragujevac (FGSK) Sweden: KTH Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) VäsbyNew Gymnasium (VNG) Croatia: University of Zagreb (UniZg) Landsurveying school (LS) Ireland: University of Limerick (UL), Ireland Coláiste Chiaráin (CC)

Application Cases Partner AC Soft Skill KTH Math Coach VNG Sociology Communication, Collaboration, Problem Solving, Self Regulation VNG Sociology Communication, Knowledge Construction, Self-Regulation UB Computer Programming Enthusiasm, Innovation, Critical Thinking, Communication, Collaboration, Leadership FGSK Civic Education (CE) Teamwork, Collaboration, Communication, Active Listening, Conflict Resolution UNIZG Electrical Engineering Communication, Collaboration, Innovation, Creativity LS English & Geodetic Measurement Communication, Peer Support, Self-Regulation CC Junior Cycle Key Skills Communication, Collaboration, Innovation UL Initial Teacher Education Articulate, Collaboration, Creative, Knowledgeable, Proactive, Responsible

Challenges Badge Currency Teacher Pedagogy Capture of Evidence Assessment validity Subjectivity of assessment Discrimination of Quality

Currency Learning Outcomes Award Stakeholders Soft Skill Metric: Category of Soft Skill Soft Skill Importance Statement Pedagogical Approach Task/Content Assessment Metric Learning Outcomes Award Stakeholders

Pedagogy Intent Context and Situation Untangle Assessment If you are measuring Soft Skill – You have to teach them Context and Situation Age appropriate development supporting hard skill acquisition Untangle Exclusivity of Soft Skill evidence Assessment Recognition and identification of Quality

Assessment

Application Case UL Graduate Attributes Knowledgeable Creative Responsible Collaborative Articulate Proactive UL Graduate Attributes

ASSIST Multi-disciplinary awards initiative open to students in the Technology Teacher Education programmes in the University of Limerick It is managed by the Technology Education Research Group (TERG) in partnership with the GRASS consortium Structured around the UL graduate attributes the project focuses on developing pedagogical approaches and ICT tools and services for representing soft skills in a quantitative, measurable way, so that they can become the subject of formal validation and recognition.

Graduate Attributes

Badge Constellation ASSIST Award Graduate Attributes Soft Skills

Capturing Multi-Modal Evidence

Contribution to an Individual Problem Contribution Solution

Contribution to Community Contribution of Resources to Entire Online Community

Capturing Multi-Modal Evidence

ASSIST Award Programmes support development of Soft skills Students target badges Generate evidence Submit for assessment Feedback/Award Actualise badges for recognition of skills

Assessment Suitability of traditional grading (A,B,C,D,E, F, NG) Measure of the efficacy of your actions Educational transaction Self Peer Objective Developmental association Holistic Weighted Judgement

Assessment Validity Construct Content Criteria Threats to Validity Construct irrelevant variance Construct under-representation

Future Work Develop badging infrastructure that will incorporate: Generic Soft Skill Awards Context Soft Skill Awards Developmental Recognition Awards

Thank you Questions Contact details: Donal.canty@ul.ie Niall.seery@ul.ie