Session 3: Bringing Open Education into the Foreign Language Profession Carl Blyth | Director, COERLL Rachael Gilg | Projects Manager, COERLL August 10, 2012

Becoming an Open Foreign Language Educator: Challenges & Badges for Professional Development 1.Professional Development Landscape (Carl) 2.An Introduction to Open Badges for Learning (Rachael) 3.COERLL Challenges & Badges for Professional Development (Carl)

Stories of Open Foreign Language Educators

Professional development knowledge ecology Teacher Education—Colleges grant degrees Continuing Education—TEA grants credits BUT… Three BIG problems with professional development

The rise of informal learning Informal Learning, Life-long learning—grants knowledge but no degree, no credit Informal online classes, learning networks, mentorship, peer learning, volunteer, learning- by-doing, etc.

The underspecified college degree Degrees perform an important function but they represent knowledge as an abstraction, far removed from actual learning. People with the same degree will likely have very different skill sets. Need for more granularity.

Inaccurate or unverifiable résumés Employers cannot easily validate information Employers rarely verify skills because they lack the competence to assess the skills

COERLL Badges are… An alternative, informal system of professional development and credentialing Visual representation of a skill or achievement Verifiable granting agency Verifiable evidence of achievement Flexible level of granularity

An Introduction to Open Badges for Learning

Digital Badges Originated online, associated with gaming Some are just for fun or social status

Badges for Learning

OPEN Badges for Learning Mozilla Open Badge Infrastructure provides a way to share badges you have earned across different websites and online communities Open Badges can follow you wherever you go online. Social media Your blog Your professional portfolio

School of Ed / School of Open Challenge: Certified Networked Teacher Course: OER in the K12 Classroom Study Group: Connected Educator Month August ng P2PU Professional Development

Badge systems are poised to hit the mainstream soon Article in EdWeek on badges in K12http:// Article in Chronicle of Higher Ed on badges at UC Davis:

Professional Development Challenges openness/challenges/ openness/challenges/

Future Professional Development Opportunities COERLL is working on developing badges around 2 existing open professional development resources: Foreign Language Teaching Methods Spanish Proficiency Traininghttp://laits.utexas.edu/spthttp://laits.utexas.edu/spt

FL Teaching Methods Badges Assessment Challenge 1. Work through each the four lessons in the online video-based module at your own pace. 2. Complete the Review and Reflect section at the end of each lesson. Post your reflection to share with other learners. 3. Complete the Portfolio assignment at the end of the module. Share your Portfolio item as an Open Educational Resource. 4. Receive a badge!

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