A Comparative Study of Gameplay of Different Sets of Players in an Engineering Mapping Game

Educators in the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) field are constantly employing different tools to make the process of education streamlined and fun. The digital gaming platform also called e-gaming platform has evolved as one of the key tools to make STEM education more accessible to students. UNTANGLED III is such an e-gaming platform that is based on STEM concepts and aims to bring in players from all educational backgrounds under a common platform. The data obtained from the game gave us insights on how males and females play the game. It has answered whether there are any significant differences in the gameplay strategies between males and females. The data pertaining to the types of puzzles that players, from both genders, chose and played, was also obtained. Males and females had no stark differences in the strategies that they used in solving the puzzles. They used similar kinds of moves and in fact solved similar kinds of puzzles of similar difficulty levels. During their gameplay sessions, both the males and the females visualized similar patterns in the puzzles as evident in their final solution. The performance of players from both the genders, based on the gameplay data was at par. Suggestions obtained from the current players and outreach events hold the key to increasing the overall participation in the game

Spatial Intelligence as Related to Success on Regular and Constrained Electronic Puzzle Formats

This paper is focused on how spatial learners perform on regular and constrained puzzles in an online scientific game. We used UNTANGLED, an interactive game to conduct the study presented in this manuscript. Players were presented a set of puzzles in both regular and constrained versions. The motivation behind this study was to examine the success rate of spatial learners in regular and constrained settings of the same puzzles. Our results suggest that spatially intelligent participants who played both regular and constrained puzzle format of the same game showed significant differences at the p=.05 level, indicating a level of spatial intelligence that is unprecedented. These participants showed signs of spatial intelligence necessary to solve electrical engineering problems. Our findings suggest a valuable use for electronic puzzles/games to determine which students are spatially intelligent, and potentially suited to engineering. In addition, teachers could use the data from spatially directed puzzles to challenge students to heighten levels of spatial intelligence by using puzzles in non-STEM environments

Solving Electrical Engineering Puzzles Using Spatial Reasoning

The precursor of any problem-solving strategy is the visualization of the problem at hand. When dealing with problems pertaining to STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) areas, visualization plays a very significant role in addressing the same. Several initiatives are being taken to improve the visualization skills of the students and spatial reasoning techniques have proved to be one of the most widely accepted tools for addressing the problems in the STEM field. In this paper, we specifically address the use of spatial reasoning to solve problems in the form of puzzles taken from electrical engineering and analyze the fruitfulness of employing such a strategy. The puzzles are hosted in an online interactive framework called UNTANGLED and classified into different categories on the basis of the nature of the puzzles and their difficulties. The results indicate that spatial reasoning technique indeed helped the players to successfully complete the puzzles. The interpretation of the data led to the conclusion that spatial reasoning techniques are imperative when it comes to discerning and resolving a problem, especially in the STEM domain

Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Motivation in an Interactive Engineering Game

In this paper, we study intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation in players playing an electrical engineering gaming environment. We used UNTANGLED, a highly interactive game to conduct this study. This game is developed to solve complex mapping problem from electrical engineering using human intuitions. Our goal is to find whether there are differences in the ways anonymous players solved electrical engineering puzzles in an electronic gaming environment when motivated to play competitively, as compared to self-regulated play. For our experiments, we used puzzles from four games from UNTANGLED. A one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was calculated on participants’ scores, type of plays, number of plays, and time spent playing, as both self-regulated and competitive players. We also examined difference between the type of moves used by the competitive and self-regulated players. Our results support the theory of motivation as being internally embedded in learners. The results also demonstrate that a self-regulated learner does not require motivation to improve one’s performance

Analyzing Artifact Interaction Complexity

The underlying motivation for our research is the need for a deeper understanding of human-computer interaction that can speak to the increasingly varied and intricate forms of interactivity and interfaces that are present in everyday life. With this purpose in mind we have examined and ‘tested’ an already existing theoretical framework on interaction complexity. We have done this by applying an analytical, artifactist methodological approach. Our studies have led to both support and criticism of the existing framework, and allowed us to develop and extend it further. Our conclusion is that an artifactist approach has potential and that there is much to explore and learn by studying interaction and interactivity based on such an approach

How to design for persistence and retention in MOOCs?

Design of educational interventions is typically carried out following a design cycle involving phases of investigation, conceptualization, prototyping, implementation, execution and evaluation. This cycle can be applied at different levels of granularity e.g. learning activity, module, course or programme. In this paper we consider an aspect of learner behavior that can be critical to the success of many MOOCs i.e. their persistence to study, and the related theme of learner retention. We reflect on the impact that consideration of these can have on design decisions at different stages in the design cycle with the aim of en-hancing MOOC design in relation to learner persistence and retention, with particular attention to the European context

Gamification in Agricultural Vocational Training

La gamificación consiste en aplicar el desarrollo de juegos en aquellas actividades donde no es habitual utilizarlos, como la educación. El desarrollo de la docencia apoyada por juegos y la evolución de las TICs, acrecentada por la irrupción del COVID19, ha provocado que muchos docentes busquen alternativas a la docencia clásica y decidan incluir juego basados en la web en sus modelos. Bajo este precepto, este TFM pretende impulsar la inclusión de estos juegos en la Formación Profesional Agraria, concretamente en la Escuela Agraria de Vícar en Almería, en el módulo Maquinaria e Instalaciones Agroforestales del ciclo de Técnico Superior Agrícola en Paisajismo y Medio Rural. Para ello, se ha desarrollado un juego tipo trivial utilizando la plataforma online Triviando.com. Esta nueva herramienta ha sido probada en una sesión de docencia online a través de la herramienta Zoom, teniendo gran aceptación por parte de los alumnos del módulo. Abstract: Gamification consists in applying the development of games in those activities where it is not usual to use them, such as education. The development of teaching supported by games and the evolution of ICTs, increased by the irruption of COVID19, has led many teachers to seek alternatives to classical teaching and decide to include web-based games in their models. Under this precept, this TFM aims to promote the inclusion of these games in the Agricultural Vocational Training, specifically in the Agricultural School of Vicar in Almeria, in the module Machinery and Agroforestry Facilities of the cycle of Higher Agricultural Technician in Landscaping and Rural Environment. For this, a trivia game has been developed using the online platform Triviando.com. This new tool has been tested in an online teaching session through the Zoom tool, having great acceptance by the students of the module