Gamification in education: when a regular course becomes a quest

Gamification is one of the most effective tools for involving students in the educational process. Expert of the online university “Netology” Maria Pankova analyzed why gamification is needed and how it works

Gamification is used in school and higher education, language schools, online training courses and staff training. I note right away that the conversation here will focus mainly on online learning.

To begin with, it’s worth defining what we mean by gamification: many people see here only game mechanics, but in reality this includes a wide variety of tools that improve user experience.

Let’s look at examples. Variation in homework is gamification? No. And what about the points that are awarded to a person for completing homework? Also no. But if we make the points public, and we get a rating system (in fact, a competition), this will already be gamification. If tasks of varying difficulty are initially offered for a certain “price”, which can affect the rating, this will also be gamification.

Thus, this is a kind of mechanics or a set of tools that make it possible to diversify the educational process and bring into it not only an entertaining component, but also an educational, social and motivational one.

Gamification elements make the standard course more interesting. For example, game mechanics can motivate you to do homework and solve tests, and if the topic is too complicated, then simple examples with gamification will help you better understand and learn the material for the future.

A large skills course in which students risk “drowning” is usually supplemented with a rating – such a tool gives an incentive to go to the end. And incentive badges or points for various actions when performing practical tasks will motivate him to pass it on time.

Among other things, game mechanics make the activities themselves more memorable. You are more likely to recommend this course to a friend, because you remember that it was interesting to take it.

There can be two variants of gamification on the course: end-to-end and point.

• A cross-cutting one goes through the entire course and helps the student throughout the entire training: a system of “achievements” (titles, rewards), visualization of educational progress or a game scenario (for example, saving a company from viruses while taking a course).
• Dot is also a good teaching aid. For example, courses with webinars. Indeed, webinars are sometimes boring: they are long, you have to constantly pay attention in order not to listen to some important material. The story is brought to life with interactive tools.

One of these tools was used by my friend tutor in group math classes. He gave the students a problem and answer options using the web service Kahoot! . The learning task turned into a mini-competition, where the rating depended on the correctness and speed of the answer. Agree, it’s not so boring anymore.

Gamification is a very popular tool, so course creators are now trying to use game mechanics as often as possible. Unfortunately, due to the lack of experience and expertise, teachers often make mistakes that spoil the students’ impression of the course and the entire educational process as a whole. We list a few common mistakes, noticing which, you can safely finish the training.

1. Poorly crafted script. Best of all, if you believe in the script, as you believe in the plot of the film. Remember how often we, sitting at the cinema, roll our eyes with the words: “Well, yes, of course … So he would have entered this terrible house! ..” Distrust of the plot arises, immersion falls. We have the same feeling if the course creators give implausible cases, offer to participate in a competition with an indefinite goal, without explaining the rules of the game “on the shore”.

A reverse example that has shown its success: the Department of Netology in Data Science (data science. -) recently held an online superhero marathon. It was based on a well-developed scenario of fighting the villains, starting with the collection of data and ending with the final battle. At the end of each lesson, students received a plot seed for the next lesson. As a result, the students really liked this format, everyone reached the final battle.

2. Too much is not good. If the creators offer both a game scenario, and points, and titles, and artifacts, such a number of game embellishments of the course are simply bound to scare you. Being distracted by all the games, you won’t even remember what exactly you wanted to learn in the process of studying.

In my practice, there was a heavily gamified forum. Its functionality provided for the mechanics of titles awarded for activity, and there were about 50 of them. This is too much: I saw how people begin to get lost in the variety of “achievements”, some were annoyed by this, others, on the contrary, set as their goal to score as many achievements as possible and did not focus on the educational component of the event.

3. Gamification for its own sake. Any element in the educational process takes the time and effort of the student. So why waste them if the main goal is to learn, not to play?

In corporate training, I have repeatedly seen courses where you need to go through locations and collect artifacts, but these items did not carry any value. It turns out that you collect them for the sake of collecting them. Each subject should be related to the topic of the course, the learning value should be visible in each artifact, and, importantly, you should see the explanations of the course creators about what it all is and how it will be useful in the future. If this is not the case, the course is poorly prepared.

A good example of the correct distribution of gamification elements was at CONTENTED. The project launched a course-challenge to promote business on the Internet. To help students, they were offered a checklist for every day, following which you can “pump” your business in a month. The mechanics are simple, but it allowed each student to clearly see the learning path and future results, which gives a strong motivation not to start studying.

You, as a learner, should constantly analyze your experience of interacting with game mechanics. If you took a course with at least one of the tools listed above, consider how it affected your learning. Did it help you absorb the information, or did it hinder you? Motivated or discouraged learning? Or maybe you did not pay attention to it while studying?

Such an analysis will allow you to act correctly when choosing the next courses. If you find it difficult to motivate yourself on your own, pay attention to gamification in training and choose active gaming courses. And if you are distracted by such tools, choose training with a more standard approach, where you do not have to waste your attention on unnecessary interaction with the system.

1. Instruction at the head of everything. The student must know the rules of the game. Engagement and interest will be as great as possible when people understand what awaits them in principle. We talked about this in the block of common mistakes.

2. Forget about stereotypes. Often, course creators are afraid to include game mechanics, thinking that teenagers are skeptical about everything, middle-aged people value their time and do not want games, and those who are older are no longer children to play while learning. It is not true. As practice shows, everyone is interested in playing.

For example, people of all ages enjoy learning at Lingualeo. Users “feed” the virtual lion Leo with their progress in learning English, and the more progress, the happier the character. In order to feed the lion “to your fill”, you must study the time that you indicated in your personal account as a daily allowance.

3. The student must have different motivation. Most of the gamification tools refer to external motivation, as there is an impact on a person by mechanics from the outside (stimuli and reinforcement). External motivation is very powerful, but it is not long-term. It is difficult for a student to stay on “achievements” and ratings for half a year. Therefore, internal motivation should be connected: the user should formulate the goals to which he is going, strive for self-regulation of learning; he needs to be shown that he himself is responsible for the result, and not the teacher or parents.

4. Experiment. No need to be afraid to try different formats, test different game mechanics. Walking the beaten track is the easiest, but it’s boring. Boring not only for those who design the learning, but also for the learners themselves.

Interesting examples of the implementation of gamification can be found in the field of corporate training. Game mechanics are also actively used in this direction. For example, a gamified welcome course for PepsiCo employees implemented as a quest. A new employee of the company solves interactive tasks in real office locations, communicates with colleagues, studies videos and slides. That is, the adaptation takes place in conditions as close as possible to real work in the office (panoramas of the working space were filmed in advance), it is interesting, interactive and not boring.

5. Pleasure. This is one of the most important goals of gamification. Each time, receiving an “achievement”, the student should experience pleasure. Therefore, game tools must be designed so that they “land” on the audience, and people can potentially relate the awarded titles to themselves.

You can often find rather abstract “achievements” on educational platforms: the titles of master, padawan, expert, elder. This is standard and abstract. If there is a detailed scenario, a certain level should be connected with the storyline, then the involvement will be deeper.