Module 2 Assignment – Emerging Technology & Learning Trend:  Gamification

#gamification; #Nick Pelling; #Gartner Hype Cycle; #James Gee; #Jane McGonical; #Yu-Kai Chou

Imagination is more important than knowledge; creativity is contagious – pass it on. ~ Albert Einstein

            Why not make learning fun?  Education does not need to be boring with endless lectures and daily activities.  There are ways to make students not realize that they are learning.  One of these ways is by gamifying the curriculum.  According to Mashable (2015), gamification is an instructional method that incorporates elements of gaming to motivate student learning.

More than likely you have tried an application that has been gamified without even realizing it.  For example, the Khan Academy, Waze, and Starbucks use gamification strategies to get you to learn, drive, or drink coffee.  These sites reward users with badges, awards, or free coffee.  Therefore, let us explore the history of gamification and how this method can be used to improve students’ learning experience.

 

History

            Many teachers use games to enhance their curriculum; however, the term gamification did not become popular until the end of 2010.  However, Nick Pelling, an English computer programmer, created the term gamification in 2002 and later started a consulting company in 2003 to pursue his gamification idea.  Pelling (2011) admits that his company went out of business in 2006 due to lack of interest in gamification and suggested his ideas were ahead of the times.   

            Currently, gamification is in the trough of disillusionment on Gartner’s Hype Cycle, meaning that interest is decreasing in this innovation (Gartner, Inc., 2015).  In fact, by 2014 80% of gaming applications will be considered ineffective due to inadequate design (Gartner, Inc., 2012).  For gamification to be successful, instructional designers and educators must take the time to create curricula that embrace good game design.

Figure 1 is McLuhan’s Tetrad for Gamification.  This diagram depicts how gamification enhances, obsoletes, retrieves, and reverses education.  Let us discuss each section further.

Enhances

            Research shows that students benefit when gaming is combined with learning.  A gamified curriculum increases student engagement, problem-solving and analytical skills (New Media Consortium Horizon Project, 2014; Gershenfeld, 2014).  Furthermore, there are no negative consequences of failure and students receive continuous feedback as they advance through the game (Gee, 2005). 

Obsoletes

            Gaming replaces lectures, where the teacher goes through a PowerPoint presentation reviewing an abundance of knowledge.  During lectures, students tend to get overwhelmed with the amount of information to decipher and understand.  Furthermore, the gamified curriculum is not a teacher-centered endeavor where the students listen and answer a few questions.  In other words, gaming allows students to progress through a topic at their pace providing an individualized mode of instruction in an engaging and interactive manner (Gershenfeld, 2014).

Retrieves

            Games encourage people to help each other to win the game through teamwork and collaboration (McGonigal, 2010).  This collaboration is similar to what people had to do to survive when they explored and settled in a new area.  Also, gamification encourages learning rather than assessment.  Currently, to receive funding, the education system must show that students can pass the end of grade exam and course assessments.  Therefore, students are tested on how well they can pass the test rather than what they know about a particular subject.  However, in games, students cannot progress to the next level until they prove their knowledge and skills; thereby, the focus is on what a student has learned throughout the game.

Reverses

            Gaming can help solve world problems.   For example, Gershenfeld (2014) predicts that games will be incorporated into other technologies such as wearable and virtual devices.  The gaming technology will be more realistic and advanced allowing people to solve social problems (Gershenfeld, 2014). 

Gamers are already finding solutions to problems.  Chou (2014) discussed an example where gamers solved a genetic problem in ten days through online gaming activity.  This genetic problem could not be solved by scientists ; instead a gamer found the answer to the problem. 

Furthermore, McGonigal (2010) mentions that the average child will play 10,000 hours of games by the age of 21.  This time is only eighty hours less than the amount of time they will spend in school between fifth to twelfth grades.  Therefore, gamers have the potential to find solutions for world problems due to the quantity of time focused on a game (McGonigal, 2010).

References:

Chou, Y.  (2014, February 10).  Yu-kai Chou:  Gamification to improve our world [Video file].  Retrieved from http://www.tedxlausanne.com/talk/gamification-improve-our-world

FB Comment Pics.  (n.d.).  How to stay awake during a boring class for all the bored people comment picture. Retrieved from http://fsymbols.co/5147-how-to-stay-awake-during-a-boring-class-for-all-the-bored-people.htm

Gartner, Inc.  (2015).  Gartner Hype Cycle.  Retrieved from http://www.gartner.com/technology/research/methodologies/hype-cycle.jsp

Gartner, Inc.  (2012, November 17).  Gartner says by 2014, 80 percent of current gamified applications will fail to meet business objectives primarily due to poor design.  Retrieved from http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2251015

Gee, J. P.  (2005).  Good video games and good learning.  Phi Kappa Phi Forum, 85(2), 33 – 37.

Gershenfeld, A.  (2014). Mind games. Scientific American, 310(2), 54 – 59.

Mashable.  (2015). Gamification. Retrieved from http://mashable.com/category/gamification/

McGonigal, J.  (2010, March 17).  Jane McGonigal:  Gaming can make a better world [Video file].  Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dE1DuBesGYM

New Media Consortium Horizon Project.  (2014). NMC Horizon Report:  2014 Higher Education Edition.  Retrieved from http://cdn.nmc.org/media/2014-nmc-horizon-report-he-EN-SC.pdf

Pelling, N.  (2011, August 9).  The (short) prehistory of “gamification…”  [Blog post].  Retrieved from https://nanodome.wordpress.com/2011/08/09/the-short-prehistory-of-gamification/