A Social Gamification Framework for a K-6 Social Network

A Social Gamification Framework for a K-6

Social Network

Jorge Simões, Instituto Superior Politécnico Gaya, PortugalRebeca Díaz Redondo, Universidad de Vigo, SpainAna Fernández Vilas, Universidad de Vigo, Spain

3rd International Conference on TECHNOLOGY ENHANCED LEARNING, QUALITY OF EDUCATION and EDUCATION REFORM 1

A Social Gamification Framework for a K-6 Social Network

Motivations for research in Game-based Learning and

Gamification of Education.

How Game-based Learning has been applied in schools.

Gamification and Social Gamification: definitions.

Research guidelines and main features for a social

gamification framework.

Applying social gamification in a social learning

environment.

Conclusions and Future work.

23rd International Conference on TECHNOLOGY ENHANCED LEARNING, QUALITY OF EDUCATION and EDUCATION REFORM


Young people today grow up immersed in a myriad of digital devices, thinking and processing information in a radically different way from their predecessors.



They share common interests…... They need new ways of learning that are more interactive, participative, engaging and individualized.

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http://www.mackcollier.com/how-much-does-social-media-cost-in-2011/



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Young people like

videogames

Young people don’t

feel motivated by school

and

We got students engaged in

school activities

Solution ?

Game-based Learning

Use videogames in schools

Teachers face a problem



Approaches to Game-based Learning:

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• Using commercial off-the-shelf videogames

• Contents are limited and may not be complete and accurate

• Require large budgets to compete in quality with commercial videogames

• Need for teachers with expertise in game design and game development

• Using serious games

• Put students building their own games



Another approach …

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Young people like

videogames

Young people don’t like school

and

We got students engaged in

school activities

Gamification of Education

Solution ?Using game

elements in learning activities



Gamification

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The use of game design elements in non-game contexts, to drive game like engagement in order to promote desired behaviors.

(Following definitions by Deterding, S., Dixon, D., Khaled, R., Nacke, L. (2011). From Game Design Elements to Gamefulness: Defining “Gamification”. In Proceedings of MindTrek 2011 and Bunchball, Inc.: Gamification 101: An Introduction to the Use of Game Dynamics to Influence Behavior (2010) )



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http://www.gartner.com/hc/images/215650_0001.gif

Gartner Hype Cycle



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Before 2010 the word “gamification” had never been searched into Google



Social Gamification

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The use of game design elements from social games in non-game contexts, to drive game like engagement in order to promote desired behaviors.

Gamification

Social Gamificatio

n

Video games

Social Games



Gamification

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The use of game design elements in non-game contexts, to drive game like engagement in order to promote desired behaviors.



“… game design elements …”

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also known as …

“Game mechanics”

“Game dynamics”

“Frameworks”

“Gameplay

mechanics”

“Game thinking”

“Game attributes”

“Game metaphors”(list of game mechanics in http://gamification.org/wiki/Game_Mechanics)



“… non-game contexts …”

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Education:

• High potential for the application of gamification.

• Schools already use several game elements:

Points for completing assignments Points translate to badges (grades) Rewards for desired behaviors Punishments for undesirable behaviors New level at the end of an academic

yearLee, J., Hammer, J.: Gamification in Education: What, How, Why Bother? Academic

Exchange Quarterly, 15(2) (2011)

(see Extra Credits: Gamifying Education Video)


http://vodpod.com/watch/8119516-extra-credits-gamifying-education






“… game like engagement …”

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• Using game elements does not translate directly to engagement

RQ1: “how can social gamification help educators and schools to motivate students?”

http://progresswars.com/



“… desired behaviors …”

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• How and under what circumstances can game elements drive learning behavior?

RQ2: “how effective is the use of social gamification in education?”



Research Guidelines:

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• Identify the most common game elements that are present in social games;

• Choose a set of those game elements for implementation in a K-6 social learning environment;

• The platform will then include a set of gamification tools that will be used with two purposes:

• Improving users’ loyalty and motivating them to a more active use of the platform.

• Enable teachers to set up gamified and personalised learning activities.



The framework should enable teachers to:

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• Allow repetead experimentation;

• Include rapid feedback cycles;

• Adapt tasks to skill levels;

• Increase tasks’ difficulty as students’ skills improve;

• Break complex tasks into shorter and simple sub-tasks;

• Allow different routes to success;

• Allow the recognition and reward by teachers, parents and other students.



Behaviors and Attitudes:

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• Motivate and engage students in their learning processes;

• Allow students to try new identities and roles;

• Develop a school-based identity;

• Motivate students to improve their skills with social rewards

and other incentives;

• Help students to deal with failure as part of the learning

process;

• Allow students to experience flow when learning a subject or

performing a school activity.



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The social gamification framework to be provided with the ongoing research work will be tested with an existing social learning platform:

schoooools.com

Context of Use



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Goals: empower children, preteens, parents, and educators to benefit from the enormous educational potential of Web 2.0 and social networks.

The platform was especially designed for 6 to 12 years old children.



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• Personal Learning Environment (PLE) interoperable with

traditional LMS;

• Wiki-based, simple, easy to use, open, organic,

collaborative, fun, …

• Web Social, Web 2.0: email, blogs, wikis, chat, social

networks, social bookmarking, …

• Collaborative editors: text, drawings, cartoons,

newspapers, music, radio, video, movies, TV, games, ...

• Simplicity, usability, accessibility, security, privacy.

Schoooools.com Main Features:



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Gamification Features by User Profile



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Other Existing Gamification Services and Products



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• the popularity of video games and the existence of a generation

of digital natives who are also gamers;

• Social games brought new types of players especially those who

are motivated by social interaction, participation and knowledge

sharing;

• One step beyond GBL, gamification emerged as a new trend in

the last couple of years;

• Finding how to apply social gamification in education, as an

alternative approach to GBL, and validating its application are the

main goals of our work

Conclusions:



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• Implement the proposed social gamification framework;

• The framework will be a step-by-step guide in designing socially

gamified learning contents;

• A social learning environment - schoooools.com - will provide a

set of gamification tools, organized as a dashboard to help teachers

to set, personalise and deploy gamified learning contents;

• Test and validate our work with the participation of students,

parents and teachers;

• Contribute with empirical evidence about the use of social

gamification.

Future Work:



Thank you,

Jorge Simões, Instituto Superior Politécnico Gaya, Portugal

[email protected]

@jmapsimoes

http://pt.linkedin.com/in/jmapsimoes


mailto:[email protected]

http://pt.linkedin.com/in/jmapsimoes

A Social Gamification Framework for a K-6 Social Network

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