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Is The Use of Game Elements and Game Design Techniques in Non-Game Contexts. Typical

Gamification involves designing game elements like leaderboards, avatars, points, levels, and badges to engage students in non-game contexts. Games appeal to students through social interaction, competition shown on leaderboards, and a sense of progression through levels. To gamify a classroom, teachers should 1) choose an overall goal, 2) divide it into milestones, 3) design a game board, 4) create avatars for students, 5) design badges for accomplishments, 6) include a leaderboard, and 7) consider playing in teams to encourage collaboration.

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Raquel Garcia Rojas
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35 views

Is The Use of Game Elements and Game Design Techniques in Non-Game Contexts. Typical

Gamification involves designing game elements like leaderboards, avatars, points, levels, and badges to engage students in non-game contexts. Games appeal to students through social interaction, competition shown on leaderboards, and a sense of progression through levels. To gamify a classroom, teachers should 1) choose an overall goal, 2) divide it into milestones, 3) design a game board, 4) create avatars for students, 5) design badges for accomplishments, 6) include a leaderboard, and 7) consider playing in teams to encourage collaboration.

Uploaded by

Raquel Garcia Rojas
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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GAMIFICATION

Gamification involves the design of a personalized game, a game you’re creating to engage your
students by appealing to their natural interest in gaming.
Gamification is the use of game elements and game design techniques in non-game contexts. Typical
game elements include the use of leaderboards, avatars, points, levels, rewards and badges, just to name a
few.
An overwhelming number of kids and adults play video, mobile or even Facebook games. They are
addicted! What’s so appealing about games these days is not just the game itself, but also the social
interaction and the competition. Players post their high scores and get to beat their friends. Leaderboards
show who’s first. Badges display all of your accomplishments. More importantly, a game does not simply
start and finish. There’s a progression as players move from one level to the next, the ultimate goal being to
reach the highest tier. It’s motivating. It’s engaging.
1) Choose a Goal

What do you want your students to accomplish? Is there a behavior/habit you want them to
learn? Pick any goal, but not a learning goal, like “learn the Simple Past”. Think of a longer,
overarching goals for the year, like completing homework tasks, following classroom rules, or
writing better and longer texts.

2) Divide It into Milestones

Say your goal is to get students excited about doing homework (something that for most is
not exciting at all). Think of how you can divide this into achievable steps, targets or milestones
they can progress through. For example, the first step can be “5 Tasks Completed On Time”; the
next step can be “10 Tasks Completed On Time” and so on. You can make this as simple or as
complex as you like (you may want to specify different types of homework tasks – writing,
reading, grammar – for example).

3) Design Your Game Board

Will it be a simple chart with milestones? Or a board game type of path they must travel down?
Again, you may stick to a simple design or get as creative as you want!

4) Create Avatars

How will students be represented in your game? Design avatars they can choose from or have
them design their own.

5) Create Badges

Badges are an essential part of any effective gamification experience. Students may earn a
badge when they achieve a particular milestone (“5 Tasks Completed!”) but the gaming experience
is enhanced when you allow your students to unlock “secret”, unexpected badges. For example, if a
student hands in a homework assignment with no spelling mistakes, you may announce the big
surprise: he/she has unlocked the “Spelling Bee” badge! How about some goofy badges? How
about a “Mighty Pen” badge for a student who’s written over a thousand words? Create your own
or use a site like ClassBadges, where you may award badges and students can keep track of the
ones they’ve earned.

6) Design a Leaderboard

Students will want to know where they stand. Leaderboards may not only display which
students have reached the most milestones or gained the most points, but also show achievements
and badges earned.

7) Consider Playing in Teams

Gamification in the classroom does not necessarily mean students will play individually and
compete with others. You may want to divide the class into teams and have the groups compete.
Think Harry Potter and Hogwarts. Students are divided into four “houses”. Each house earns points
for accomplishing different tasks. So in your classroom, let each team come up with their own
name and symbol/badge/image to represent them. Each team may be awarded points for winning a
game, tidying up the classroom, helping the teacher, etc... Students who misbehave or don’t respect
classroom rules may get points deducted from their team score. At the end of the year, the team
with the highest score gets a special prize.

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