Gamification is the prominent E-Learning trend in 2016. Not only 2016, it is one of the ELearning trends to watch in next 10 years according to Karl M. Kapp.
Why it is so hot trending topic now?
The effect of gamification on e-Learning is amazing and it brings out powerful results. When applying ‘game mechanics’ in the learning environment, learners are being motivated and engaged well. Retention and application skills are much better in gaming environment. For these amazing hits, we tend to Gamify in the eLearning programs.
Gamification in eLearning – What does it mean?
Gamification is integrating game mechanics with specific learning outcomes. It can be said as “Play, Learn and Grow”. It involves sound instructional design to provide a balance between specific learning objective that needs to be learned, playing games and tendency of applying knowledge and skills in the real world.
What are some of the gamification mechanics/elements and how can we integrate them to eLearning? Let us look some ideas to tryout.
Scenario:
It is a key part of many games. It is incorporated with story telling, characters, sequence of events.
Rules:
Rules are a critical part of any game to set parameters. These are what learners can and cannot do in the game play. Use specific and concise instructions for the learners to understand and communicate with the scenario.
Treasure:
Game encourages discovery and finding hidden treasures. And also people love to hunt a treasure. Boost up the game by including hidden nuggets of additional information as fun and to hunt extra points. Be sure, essential information that learner need to know are not in the part of hunting nuggets.
Interactivity:
A game without learner interaction, then it’s not a game. Games are interactive, stimulus and joyful. Think and make your content as more interactive. Instead of select or click options, design powerful interactions that induce learner’s application skills and decision making capability.
Feedback:
Immediate feedback for the learner’s action is a kind of motivation and serves as n encouragement factor for the learner’s journey. Just showing text feedback is not effective. You may provide badges, unlocking new features, and mystery boxes to show feedback.
Timer:
Timer supports to make a game more realistic and forces user to act quickly. Instruct the learner to do the activity within the given time limits.
Rewards:
In game play, people like to achieve more rewards and bonus points. Offer bonus points, score boosters, based on the user choices or difficulty of the questions.
Levels:
Levels and challenges are common element in Game mechanics. Design your course into levels/grades and unlock each level based on user’s correct answers or points earned.
Well, now let us conclude. In order to effectively integrate gamification to your courses, the game elements need to be analyzed and designed soundly.
Coursera is an education platform that partners with top universities and organizations worldwide, to offer courses online for anyone to take.
White House Business Solution Pvt Ltd., is one of the coursera course developers for an international organization for the past 4 years.
WHBS adopts gamification techniques, design and develop effective game based eLearning courses based on the customer needs.
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