Category Archives: Diigo Links

I spent today reading. And, I read a lot. My goal was to read up on Gamification. I wanted to understand its history, its role in education, criticism of the concept, as well as ways to move forward with some ideas.

I used Diigo to capture my thoughts. There are four different colors of highlighting available, and I used the highlighters to denote each of these topics above. Yet, when I went to my library view, all of my highlights combined. This threw me for a loop, and I wasn’t able to process the thoughts the way I had hoped today. So, I will need to go back and review and rethink my research. That’s not all bad. There’s only so much Gamification my brain could handle today.  Below you’ll see my mess of thoughts from Diigo.  Realize, there is no real organization with this export. When I have process through the material, I will share here on the blog.

If you would simply like to see the list of Gamification sites that I visited today, you can check them out here: http://goo.gl/5CgNH

Note: The texts below are highlighted directly from resources and not my own thoughts yet.

• The Best Of Gaming |
  Scoop.ittags: gaming gamification games
• MultiMedia
  Fusion 2.0 Create Games/Apps Drag-and-Drop!tags: multimedia games gamification

• 
  • Write your own gaming tool?

• GameMaker8.com | Game Maker 8tags: Games gamification
  • 
    • Write your own game program.
• Epistemic Games – building
  the future of educationtags: gamification games STEM interactive simulations
• Gamification
  Educationtags: gamification

• 
  • Growing collection of Gamification in
    education.
• Gamification
  Examples | Gamification.orgtags: gamification
• Math
  and Biology Lessons To Go Massively Multiplayer and Online in MIT Project — THE
  Journaltags: gamification MIT

• An MIT research team that explores the value of
  learning through games has just received a $3 million boost to create an MMOG–a
  massively multiplayer online game–specifically to teach math and biology to
  high schoolers.
• Filament
  Games,

• 10
  practical ways to bring gamer superpowers to the classroom | Game-Based Learning
  | Scoop.ittags: gamification
• 12
  Education Tech Trends to Watch in 2012 | MindShifttags: Trends BestPractice Newsworthy gamification

• The big question, of course — with this as with
  every new ed-tech development: does this actually improve learning? When is a
  educational game fun? What makes it engaging? What makes it actually
  educational?
• www.kansascity.com
  | 12/13/2011 | Joe Robertson | Games are focus of Quest schoolstags: gamification
• Competition
  or Cooperation? Gamification Succeeds at Both | Gamification Blogtags: gamification
  • On Forbes a few weeks ago, author Haydn Shaughnessy
    looked
    at the rise of gamification and the return of game-like competition to the
    workplace.
  • On average, only 5% of players focus primarily on
    competition, whereas 75% are primarily collaborators.
  • Instead, managers and designers need to create a
    team environment where collaboration is the focus and collaborative results lead
    to a competitive advantage.
• Gamifying
  Homework – ProfHacker – The Chronicle of Higher Educationtags: gamification
  • social media tells us much, it’s that people will
    do *anything* for a virtual badge.
  • Critics warn that too-shallow an interpretation of
    game mechanics will lead either to an excessive focus
    on points, or to missing the open-ended
    possibilities of gaming.
  • Across those 400 students, 113 (28%!) willingly
    chose to take optional multiple choice quizzes.
• Badgeville
  EducationWhy shouldn’t learning be fun? Whether your students
  have opted in to their educational experience, or are going through a required
  training program, adding a social rewards program turns a challenging experience
  into a challenge with obtainable victories along the way to the student’s final
  goal. With Badgeville, you can easily add real-time, social rewards to your
  education program.tags: gamification
  • Why shouldn’t learning be fun? Whether your
    students have opted in to their educational experience, or are going through a
    required training program, adding a social rewards program turns a challenging
    experience into a challenge with obtainable victories along the way to the
    student’s final goal. With Badgeville, you can easily add real-time, social
    rewards to your education program.
• http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7075.pdftags: gamification
• Lessons
  from the Trenchestags: gamification
  • we selected the term EduGame for its brevity and
    clarity and because it encompasses all games and simulations (video games,
    console games, and virtual worlds) used in classrooms.
  • Convincing all the stakeholders to support
    implementation of EduGames takes more effort and focus than do traditional
    supplemental materials.
  • Teachers must understand their role as content area
    experts.
  • EduGames must be aligned to
    standards.
  • Teachers must understand how the activities connect
    to the standards, what the goals are for the exercise, and which students it can
    benefit the most.
  • Mix game play with discussion, lecture, reading,
    and writing to gain the most benefits.
  • Given the novelty of game-based learning, many
    educators remain skeptical of the games’ ability to facilitate learning or to
    embed assessments appropriately. It is important to provide external validation
    of the learning that is taking place.
  • Treat gaming like you would a lab, as an
    opportunity for students to apply and test what they have learned. Set clear
    behavioral expectations, and make assessment results visible to all stakeholders
    to sustain support.
• Why Education
  Needs to Get Its Game Ontags: gamification
  • chools should not just prepare students to pass
    state assessments and standardized tests. We should also prepare them for the
    complex real-world situations they will certainly face. If we recalibrate our
    education system to meet the needs of the digital natives, we can produce eager,
    life-long learners who are well-equipped for 21st century
    careers.
  • For one, games can create a risk-free environment
    for learning and discovery. In most games, failure is a given. Often players
    must “die” several times before accruing the knowledge and skills necessary to
    win. Since a certain amount failure is normal within the game, players will
    naturally take the approach of trial and error to discover the path to
    success.
  • While this type of risk-free environment can be
    difficult to replicate in the classroom, educators and parents should keep in
    mind that creating opportunities for students to safely fail is the best way to
    ensure that real learning breakthroughs occur. Kids who are not frustrated by
    failure, who instead see it as part of the process, are less likely to give up
    on learning. This is a valuable lesson that can be modeled through learning
    games and applied in the real world.
  • good games are designed to make players want to
    work hard to achieve a goal. In the game world this is known as “grinding.”
    Grinding is the hard (often repetitive) work that is required to achieve a
    desired outcome.
  • The truth is that school doesn’t have to be as fun
    as World of Warcraft — it just has to be less boring than it is
    today
  • If we tap into motivational game dynamics like
    small achievable goals, desirable rewards, constant positive feedback and
    compelling interactive content, then we can design an educational experience
    that speaks to teens.
• Clark
  Aldrich Designs: Using Serious Games and Simulations: A Quick and Dirty
  GuideThe Eight C’s It is in the flow of enterprise skills
  that an organization has to ensure the value proposition of formal learning. The
  full equation looks something like: (Content * Curricula * Coaching *
  Certification * Community * Calling *day Care) / Cost, where each are defined as
  follows: Content: The material supporting any learning objective. Curricula: How
  the content is chosen, validated, organized, and presented. Coaching: The
  individual attention helping each student overcome their individual weaknesses,
  answers specific questions, and leverage their individual strengths, as well as
  provide motivation. Certification: Proof and documentation that a level of
  competency has been reached (which also provides motivation). Community: A group
  of peers that both make learning more effective and engaging. Calling: The
  vision and mission of the learning organization. day Care: The ability to house
  students for a specific time, including classrooms and even virtual environment
  tools. Cost: The amount of resources, including student time, a program
  requires.tags: gamification
  • A good educational simulation may look a lot like a
    casual computer game. It may have stylized, fast moving graphics. There may be a
    timer during some part of a level, and exaggerated consequences of failure. The
    person engaging the sim may look very much like a gamer, hunched over with a
    hand tightly grasped on the mouse and eyes riveted on the screen. The student
    may even be in a flow state, and having a lot of fun.

  • The Eight C’s

     

    It is in the flow of enterprise skills that an organization has to ensure the
    value proposition of formal learning. The full equation looks something like:
    (Content * Curricula * Coaching * Certification * Community * Calling *day Care)
    / Cost, where each are defined as follows:

     

    • Content: The material supporting any learning objective.
    • Curricula: How the content is chosen, validated, organized, and
      presented.
    • Coaching: The individual attention helping each student overcome their
      individual weaknesses, answers specific questions, and leverage their individual
      strengths, as well as provide motivation.
    • Certification: Proof and documentation that a level of competency has been
      reached (which also provides motivation).
    • Community: A group of peers that both make learning more effective and
      engaging.
    • Calling: The vision and mission of the learning organization.
    • day Care: The ability to house students for a specific time, including
      classrooms and even virtual environment tools.
    • Cost: The amount of resources, including student time, a program
      requires.
• A
  Neurologist Makes the Case for the Video Game Model as a Learning Tool |
  Edutopiatags: gamification
  • The popularity of video games is not the enemy of
    education, but rather a model for best teaching strategies. Games insert players
    at their achievable challenge level and reward player effort and practice
    with acknowledgement of incremental goal progress, not just final
    product. The fuel for this process is the pleasure experience related to the
    release of dopamine.
  • After making a prediction, choice, or action, and
    receiving feedback that it was correct, the reward from the release of dopamine
    prompts the brain seek future opportunities to repeat the
    action.
  • If there is no risk, there is no reward. If there
    is no challenge, such as adding single digit numbers by a student who has
    achieved mastery in adding double-digit numbers, there is activation of the
    dopamine-reward network.
  • Individualized achievable challenge level is
    one where a task, action, or choice is not so easy as to be essentially
    automatic or 100% successful.
  • The brain operates to conserve its resources unless
    the energy cost is low or the expectation of reward is high. In the classroom,
    that is the ideal level of instructional challenge for student
    motivation.
  • Students working toward clear, desirable goals
    within their range of perceived achievable challenge, reach levels of engagement
    much like the focus and perseverance we see when they play their video
    games
  • Gamers reportedly make errors 80% of the time, but
    the most compelling games give hints, cues, and other feedback so players’
    brains have enough expectation of dopamine reward to persevere.
  • The player gains points or tokens for small
    incremental progress and ultimately the powerful feedback of the success of
    progressing to the next level. This is when players seek “harder
    work”.
  • However, individualized instruction, assignments,
    and feedback, that allow students to consistently work at their individualized
    achievable challenge levels, are time-consuming processes not possible for
    teachers to consistently provide all students.
  • Compared to an adult brain, a young brain needs
    more frequent dopamine boosts to sustain effort, persevere through challenges
    and setbacks, and build the trait of resilience. The brain’s prefrontal cortex,
    with its executive functions
• Projects | Filament
  Gamestags: gamification games interactive simulations
• Learning games that shine | Filament
  Gamestags: gamification learninggames

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are
here.