Emoti-Con! is an annual youth digital media and technology challenge, now in its third year. On June 2, 2012, over 150 New York City youth from programs throughout the five boroughs will gather to showcase digital media and technology projects designed for the betterment of the world, be inspired by their peers, and meet professionals in the field. Youth will compete for awards in multiple categories, including most innovative and best potential for social impact.

The A-Team is comprised of a group of high school students who will be helping to plan Emoti-Con! Some of their tasks leading up to the event will include: setting the agenda, choosing guest speakers, promotion and outreach, and designing a youth-led workshop.

For our first session, youth viewed videos and photos from last year’s Emoti-Con! and learned the previous youth committee did to prepare for the event. Then they were asked to write or draw all of their talents, skills, and past digital media projects on index cards, which were then assembled into a talent “tree”. These are skills they can transfer and hone as they plan for Emoti-Con!

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*Emoti-Con! has been developed through a unique grass-roots collaboration amongst several NYC youth-serving organizations (MOUSE, Global Kids, the New York Public Library, and Parsons The New School for Design) to address the needs for cross-institutional collaboration and to provide the much needed face-to-face venue for youth to connect across digital media and technology projects.

The system is based on the recognition that learning in the 21st Century takes place not just in classrooms, but after school and through informal uses of digital media. To develop life-long learning skills, youth need to recognize how they are learning valuable skills across these venues and how to strategically navigate these sites of learning. Badge systems are designed to provide scaffolding, motivation, and recognition.

(Youth who are working on badges at Epstein can receive a power-up to miss certain classes to work on their next badge. They must wear this tag on the right to identify themselves.)

The Epstein Badging System includes a number of elements, including the badges themselves, digital transcripts, a badge management system, a badge submission process, committees, learning rubrics, back-end infrastructure, and digital portfolios.

Yesterday, Barry and I, along with the school’s Instructional Coordinator, taught one of the sixth grade classes how to use Voicethread, the tool where they will be creating digital portfolios. They learned to create slides, upload and take images, and comment through text and audio. Afterwards, we spent time working with staff on the back end infrastructure to ensure that the badge management system was working properly.

We also had the chance to meet with two groups of students to conduct focus groups. The first group of students had chosen to earn badges, while the second group had not. Much was learned from chatting with the amazingly eloquent students and a full report will be put together with key findings. One of the highlights was that badges were a motivating factor for students in the school who were not generally the “honors” students; earning badges has given this group the opportunity to have their abilities recognized by their community. Many of the youth who chose to earn badges were pursuing interest-driven projects outside of their schoolwork obligations. They were also able to describe the difference between grades and badges as a form of achievement.

For the group of youth who have chosen not to pursue badges, all of them cited that they lacked the time to do so, with competing priorities of extracurricular activities and heavy homework loads. Interestingly enough, for this group, the connection between the activities they were already involved with and the badges they could earn were not entirely clear to them. For example, if they played a team sport, they did not make the connection that they could, in fact, earn the Collaboration badge.

We ended the day with a workshop for the faculty, where Barry gave a “big picture” on badges, including the history of digital badges and the recent Digital Media & Learning: Badges for Lifelong Learning Competition. Teachers asked questions about badges, many of which were around issues of credibility and credentialing, and were excited to be part of such an important and new innovation.

To view the full Flickr set, click here.

One entry to highlight is Kendell’s, who wrote:
Our trip to E-Line Media taught me a lot about the complex process of creating a chapter for Gamestar Mechanic and also about the many different jobs there are at E-Line. I learned how each member of E-Line contributes something to the finished product, whether it be the dialogue or the expression on the characters’ faces, and that the process involves a great deal of give and take. In the end, the team at E-Line Media will have produced a chapter that along with conveying the right message to the player, is appealing to everyone.

Youth spent the majority of the session designing their own challenge around a serious issue, except they did it entirely with paper and pen, rather than online. One group chose global warming as an issue and another group chose violence prevention. Each group brainstormed a story narrative and then wrote or drew out each step on index cards, including an intro, missions, and outro, in keeping with Gamestar Mechanic’s usual challenge format.

Each group approached the assignment differently. The violence prevention group chose to detail their narrative and got very specific with the story, as you can see from their design here:

The global warming group also had a coherent story, but focused more on game design and game play elements in Gamestar Mechanic. For each mission, they had goals, obstacles, and the main core mechanic written out. You can see their design in the image below.

Keep it up!