In my last posting I mentioned the idea of "Gamification" and Anna
thoughtfully pointed out that we need to " define what
"gamification" means to learning development. " I
couldn't agree more and I have spent the last year exploring that
concept to see what Gamification does mean to learning and
development professionals.
For more on this, see my posting
In Defense ofthe Term Gamification as used by
Learning Professionals on
Kapp Notes, and be sure to read the
insightful and provocative comments.
So on this posting, let's define Gamification.
"Gamification is using game-based mechanics, aesthetics and game
thinking to engage people, motivate action, promote learning, and
solve problems."
Now, when most people think of "gamification" they
think of rewards, points, and achievements and how artificially
incentivizing people to do things based solely on rewards is a
losing proposition (and most of the time it is), so let's look at
the characteristics of video games that are useful, exciting, and
engaging in terms of learning and, it turns out, in terms of video
game play.
Story
Games are interesting and motivating because they have a story,
they provide a context in which actions need to take place. Many
learning courses provide no context, no reason for actions. We need
to use story elements, plot, characters, resolution, scene setting
to help put learning back into context. Training, and the
educational system, has removed training or learning events too far
from the actual application of the knowledge. Stories bring context
back. Additionally, research indicates that people remember facts
better when they are in a story than when they are presented in a
bulleted list.
Feedback
Another element in games is immediate feedback. When you play Pac
Man, you know right away how you are doing; you visually see the
number of dots left to be eaten and how close the ghosts are to
cornering you. From a learning perspective, feedback is
a critical element for facilitating learning. Providing frequent
opportunities for students to respond during a lesson helps with
learning as shown in research. Most of our learning courses do an
extremely poor job of providing immediate feedback. Additionally,
the feedback typically is not based on action or activity, it's
based on knowledge - how well the learner could "temporarily"
remember what was covered earlier in the course. This isn't
meaningful feedback. Gamification can provide, in the form of
points or "health" or "lives" feedback on progress.
Games provide meaningful and immediate feedback far more
effectively and efficiently than a classroom instructor. Game-based
thinking and mechanics can help learning designers think about
continuous corrective feedback.
Freedom to Fail and Chance
In an instructional environment, failure is not a valid option. In
games it's encouraged with multiple lives and attempts. Games
overcome the "sting of failure" specifically by doing things like
giving multiple opportunities to perform a task until mastery and
through the introduction of chance or randomness (two elements that
schools and corporations work hard to eliminate). In fact, research
indicates that gaming uncertainty can transform the emotional
experience of learning improving engagement and, more importantly,
improving encoding and later recall.
Levels
Games do a great job of providing personalized experiences. In many
games I can choose an entry point of easy, intermediate, or
difficult. Most online learning experiences are developed for
"one-size-fits-all" with no consideration of different skill or
knowledge backgrounds. Why can't we design learning to accommodate
different skill levels just like video games?
Two things I'd like to mention before signing off for this post.
First, notice I did not mention points, rewards, or achievements.
We can apply game-based thinking without having the elements of
points or rewards. We don't need to use points or rewards as
motivation - however, we can use points and rewards as feedback on
progress. So, let's not abandon all mention of points or rewards
because we fear they may undermine intrinsic motivation, the
research is not as specific on this point as many would like. In
fact, some research indicates that intrinsic and extrinsic rewards
exist side-by-side in classroom environments and that they are not,
indeed, opposite ends of a continuum.
Second, when I mention "gamification" people often caution me that
we must "get it right" or we can cause a lot of harm and that
getting gamification right is tricky. I don't disagree but
designing any type of learning event effectively is tricky and,
unfortunately, learning professionals often mess that up.
One example is the continued, unscientifically supported use of
learning styles. So, I don't believe the argument that we should
abandon the use of gamification because it is hard to do and
because we might do it wrong. If that was the case, 40% of all
corporate learning could have to be thrown out because the
objectives are wrong, the instructional strategies are wrong and
the assessment of knowledge is wrong. You don't throw out a method
because in some cases it might be incorrectly used, instead, we
need to educate people on the correct usage of the concept.
Gamification is an exciting addition to an instructional designer's
toolkit but it should not be foreign or strange to learning and
development professionals we have been using many of the techniques
for years (check out the last link in the resources list)..
OK, this post is already longer than I anticipated.
Here are some resources to further your thinking on the subject and
if you are going to TechKnowledge, look for my session on
Wednesday, 01/25/2012 from 11:00AM -12:15PM, Room Miranda 7/8. The
description title of the talk is What Research Tells Us About 3D
Avatars, Storytelling and Serious Games for Learning and Behavior
Change
Additional posts of intere
st: