Gamification Through Algebraic Coding

From an urban high school in upstate New York, gamification was introduced through coding to teach an Algebra I unit. The Value Instrumentality Expectancy (VIE) Theory was used to measure motivation to determine if learning coding by gamifying a unit and applying it in the computer lab motivated students to learn Algebra I content. There was a significant increase in each motivational construct. This implies that if teachers dedicate themselves to learn coding and the pedagogical knowledge needed to teach a gamified unit, then there can be an increase in motivation to learn Algebra I content

Managing gamified programming courses with the FGPE platform

E-learning tools are gaining increasing relevance as facilitators in the task of learning how to program. This is mainly a result of the pandemic situation and consequent lockdown in several countries, which forced distance learning. Instant and relevant feedback to students, particularly if coupled with gamification, plays a pivotal role in this process and has already been demonstrated as an effective solution in this regard. However, teachers still struggle with the lack of tools that can adequately support the creation and management of online gamified programming courses. Until now, there was no software platform that would be simultaneously open-source and general-purpose (i.e., not integrated with a specific course on a specific programming language) while featuring a meaningful selection of gamification components. Such a solution has been developed as a part of the Framework for Gamified Programming Education (FGPE) project. In this paper, we present its two front-end components: FGPE AuthorKit and FGPE PLE, explain how they can be used by teachers to prepare and manage gamified programming courses, and report the results of the usability evaluation by the teachers using the platform in their classes.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Using “Hay Day” game to support students learning

Game based learning is one of the innovative approaches to complement classroom teaching. It utilizes game related technology and features to support and facilitate students learning. This paper discusses the deployment of game in teaching Enterprise Resources Planning (ERP) topic. After the students attended the face-to-face lecture, they are given a task to implement ERP using a game called Hay Day. Hay Day game simulate the agricultural activities, where students can apply ERP concept to manage the resources in their farm in order to obtain optimum production and profit. Student’s feedback on their experience applying ERP on Hay Day game is recorded using a set of questionnaires with 7-likert scale. At the end of the course the students take the final examination which including the ERP topic. The marks for that topic is taken and compared with previous semester students. The findings show that students are very positive towards Hay Day as a tool for their learning. Furthermore, their achievement on ERP topic is superior compared to the previous semester

The Agony of Choice – Analyzing User Preferences regarding Gamification Elements in Learning Management Systems

Gamification is an approach to motivate users of information systems by implementing game elements. Despite its potentials, the use of gamification in practice has also received criticism because most gamification elements are integrated into systems without considering the preferences of the respective users and without considering contextual aspects. Hence, we aim at identifying which elements users of learning management systems prefer. Furthermore, we want to identify their preferences regarding the amount and combination of gamification elements. To identify user preferences, we conducted a discrete choice task among learning management system users following the best-worst scaling method. Our results show that users prefer a bundle of four gamification elements: level, goals, status, and points. This is especially interesting since popular elements, such as a leaderboard or badges, are not most preferred. This highlights the need to consider user preferences and contextual aspects to ensure a successful implementation of gamification elements

Improving the Teaching of Hypothesis Testing Using a Divide-and-Conquer Strategy and Content Exposure Control in a Gamified Environment

This article belongs to the Special Issue Active Methodologies for the Promotion of Mathematical LearningHypothesis testing has been pointed out as one of the statistical topics in which students present more misconceptions. In this article, an approach based on the divide-and-conquer methodology is proposed to facilitate its learning. The proposed strategy is designed to sequentially explain and evaluate the different concepts involved in hypothesis testing, ensuring that a new concept is not presented until the previous one has been fully assimilated. The proposed approach, which contains several gamification elements (i.e., points or a leader-board), is implemented into an application via a modern game engine. The usefulness of the proposed approach was assessed in an experiment in which 89 first-year students enrolled in the Statistics course within the Industrial Engineering degree participated. Based on the results of a test aimed at evaluating the acquired knowledge, it was observed that students who used the developed application based on the proposed approach obtained statistically significant higher scores than those that attended a traditional class (p-value < 0.001), regardless of whether they used the learning tool before or after the traditional class. In addition, the responses provided by the students who participated in the study to a test of satisfaction showed their high satisfaction with the application and their interest in the promotion of these tools. However, despite the good results, they also considered that these learning tools should be considered as a complement to the master class rather than a replacement

Impact of School Closures and Virtual Instruction on Sixth Grade Reading and Math Achievement of Student Subgroups

The purpose of this quantitative, causal-comparative design study was to determine whether differences existed between the reading and math achievement of sixth grade general education students and students with disabilities who have been identified with a specific learning disability or other health impairment. This study was important because achievement gaps exist between subgroups of students (Farkas et al., 2020). The sample included scores from 144 students in a school division in Southeastern Virginia. The instrument used was the Grade 6 Reading and Math Standards of Learning assessments administered in the spring of 2021. Two one-way ANOVAs were used to compare the differences between the math and reading achievement of the three identified groups. Data collected from the 144 participants were analyzed, and findings were summarized and reported. The independent variable in this study was the educational classification of the students. The dependent variable was the students’ proficiency on the sixth grade math and reading Standards of Learning Assessments. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) was used to run two one-way ANOVAs. The results revealed significant math and reading scores differences between general education students and the other groups: other health impairments and students with specific learning disabilities

Can the implementation of an interdisciplinary retrieval practice in science facilitate students' motivation and perception about cross-curricular concepts?

This study explores the effects on online educational games as a retrieval practice on students’ retention and understanding of the cross curricular concepts between sciences and between sciences and mathematics. The implementation of an online cross-science retrieval practice was introduced to investigate whether it can facilitate students’ understanding of the interrelation of sciences and mathematics, as well as students’ motivation/ participation. It also aimed to explore teachers’ perspectives on a cross-science retrieval approach. Questionnaires were completed before and after the implementation of the intervention with 43 KS4 students and 5 science teachers participating. Based on the findings of this study, it could be suggested that there is evidence, although not at a statistically significant level, to support that applying retrieval practice with online educational games could improve students’ motivation and perception about cross-curricular concepts

Is it all about having Fun? – Developing a Taxonomy to gamify Information Systems

Gamification is a well-known approach that refers to the use of game design elements in information systems to make monotonous and tedious tasks more enjoyable. However, research and practice show that game design elements are oftentimes chosen and integrated in information systems randomly, therefore impeding the outcomes of such systems. In this regard, taxonomies can guide system developers, i.e., in selecting and combining game design elements to gamify their information system. Nonetheless, existing taxonomies do not provide such guidance for gamifying information systems. Therefore, the goal of our research is to consolidate the state of the art of gamification research and rigorously develop a gamification taxonomy. To achieve our goal, we conducted a systematic literature review and developed a taxonomy based on a rigorous taxonomy development process. We evaluate our theory by providing evidence of its feasibility with two practical cases: First, we show how the taxonomy helps to analyze existing gamification approaches, and, second, how the taxonomy guides to gamify information systems. Overall, we enrich theory by introducing a new taxonomy to better explain the meaning and characteristics of game design elements. Likewise, practitioners will be guided in selecting and combining game design elements for their gamification approaches

Examining Game-like Design Elements and Student Engagement in an Online Asychronous Course for Undergraduate University Students

Due to growing number of online university courses (Allen & Seaman, 2016; Picciano, 2015; Wladis, Wladis, & Hachey, 2014), this study examined whether game-like design strategies can be used to increase the quality of an asynchronous online course experience for undergraduate students. Student engagement is related to learning activities such as student-student, student-instructor, and student-course material interaction, as well as positive factors such as satisfaction, accomplishment, and active and collaborative learning (Kuh, Kinzie, Buckley, Bridges, & Hayek, 2006; Shea et al., 2010). While there is a growing body of literature that deals with using game mechanics in instructional design generally, less is known about how game mechanics can increase student engagement in an online, asynchronous, university-level course. The quasi-treatment design of this study allowed for the comparison of student experiences in two versions of the same asynchronous undergraduate course. Data were collected via an online survey of perceived engagement, LMS-supported analytics, and grades. This study shows the current technology use of the students. The majority of students who participated in this study have been using the internet and computers for seven years or more. Based on this study, designers and instructors of online courses may consider using game-like hidden badges as a way to improve engagement in the asynchronous learning environment. Reward schedules, clues, reminders, and profiles could be essential for efficient implementation of game mechanics

Analyzing the behavior of students regarding learning activities, badges, and academic dishonesty in MOOC environment

Mención Internacional en el título de doctorThe ‘big data’ scene has brought new improvement opportunities to most products and services, including education. Web-based learning has become very widespread over the last decade, which in conjunction with the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) phenomenon, it has enabled the collection of large and rich data samples regarding the interaction of students with these educational online environments. We have detected different areas in the literature that still need improvement and more research studies. Particularly, in the context of MOOCs and Small Private Online Courses (SPOCs), where we focus our data analysis on the platforms Khan Academy, Open edX and Coursera. More specifically, we are going to work towards learning analytics visualization dashboards, carrying out an evaluation of these visual analytics tools. Additionally, we will delve into the activity and behavior of students with regular and optional activities, badges and their online academically dishonest conduct. The analysis of activity and behavior of students is divided first in exploratory analysis providing descriptive and inferential statistics, like correlations and group comparisons, as well as numerous visualizations that facilitate conveying understandable information. Second, we apply clustering analysis to find different profiles of students for different purposes e.g., to analyze potential adaptation of learning experiences and pedagogical implications. Third, we also provide three machine learning models, two of them to predict learning outcomes (learning gains and certificate accomplishment) and one to classify submissions as illicit or not. We also use these models to discuss about the importance of variables. Finally, we discuss our results in terms of the motivation of students, student profiling, instructional design, potential actuators and the evaluation of visual analytics dashboards providing different recommendations to improve future educational experiments.Las novedades en torno al ‘big data’ han traído nuevas oportunidades de mejorar la mayoría de productos y servicios, incluyendo la educación. El aprendizaje mediante tecnologías web se ha extendido mucho durante la última década, que conjuntamente con el fenómeno de los cursos abiertos masivos en línea (MOOCs), ha permitido que se recojan grandes y ricas muestras de datos sobre la interacción de los estudiantes con estos entornos virtuales de aprendizaje. Nosotros hemos detectado diferentes áreas en la literatura que aún necesitan de mejoras y del desarrollo de más estudios, específicamente en el contexto de MOOCs y cursos privados pequeños en línea (SPOCs). En la tesis nos hemos enfocado en el análisis de datos en las plataformas Khan Academy, Open edX y Coursera. Más específicamente, vamos a trabajar en interfaces de visualizaciones de analítica de aprendizaje, llevando a cabo la evaluación de estas herramientas de analítica visual. Además, profundizaremos en la actividad y el comportamiento de los estudiantes con actividades comunes y opcionales, medallas y sus conductas en torno a la deshonestidad académica. Este análisis de actividad y comportamiento comienza primero con análisis exploratorio proporcionando variables descriptivas y de inferencia estadística, como correlaciones y comparaciones entre grupos, así como numerosas visualizaciones que facilitan la transmisión de información inteligible. En segundo lugar aplicaremos técnicas de agrupamiento para encontrar distintos perfiles de estudiantes con diferentes propósitos, como por ejemplo para analizar posibles adaptaciones de experiencias educativas y sus implicaciones pedagógicas. También proporcionamos tres modelos de aprendizaje máquina, dos de ellos que predicen resultados finales de aprendizaje (ganancias de aprendizaje y la consecución de certificados de terminación) y uno para clasificar que ejercicios han sido entregados de forma deshonesta. También usaremos estos tres modelos para analizar la importancia de las variables. Finalmente, discutimos todos los resultados en términos de la motivación de los estudiantes, diferentes perfiles de estudiante, diseño instruccional, posibles sistemas actuadores, así como la evaluación de interfaces de analítica visual, proporcionando recomendaciones que pueden ayudar a mejorar futuras experiencias educacionales.Programa Oficial de Doctorado en Ingeniería TelemáticaPresidente: Davinia Hernández Leo.- Secretario: Luis Sánchez Fernández.- Vocal: Adolfo Ruiz Callej