‘Gamification’ - the use of game elements in non-game contexts - has rapidly become one of the current hottest trends. This presentation presents an overview of what gamification is and isn’t, and reports on the author’s experiences using this approach in a graduate level education class as well as the early results of a comparison between gamified and non-gamified sections of a freshman introduction to computers course. In the current course, the non-gamified sections employ a fairly standard structure that includes various assignments spread out throughout the term, various in-class activities, and both a midterm and final exam. The gamified section organizes all student work into various quests worth from 10 to 200 ‘experience points’ (XP), most of which have no set deadlines. While the quests are effectively equivalent in grade weight to the assignments of the more traditional sections, students in the gamified section start off with a score of zero (0) and every quest they submit contributes to their final grade cumulatively. A final score of 1000 is equivalent to 100%, but the total number of possible XP is 1435. All quests were made available to students at the beginning of term; some could be repeated for XP and included a variety of ‘guild’ (group) quests and ‘solo’ quests; and many quests could be repeated to earn additional XP. The presentation will provide some background on gamification, detail the course structure, highlight early successes and failures, and conclude with strategies for incorporating meaningful gamification in other courses.

1. Gamification:
How to Gamify Learning and Instruction
PART 3
Katrin Becker

2. Introductions
1. Who Am I
2. What AM I Playing Now?
Part 1: What's All the Buzz?
1. What is Gamification?
2. An Inadvertent Con?
3. Gamification is NOT New
4. What IS New?
5. Designing Instruction to be Playful
6. Do's & Don'ts
Part 2: Case Study
1. Baby Steps: Gamification on a Small Scale
2. Increasing the Stakes
3. Going All the Way: The Current Experiment
4. Jumping the Gun - Early Conclusions
Part 3: De-Briefing
Further Resources
Overview
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3. Part 3: De-Briefing
Lessons Learned
Part 3: De-Briefing
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4. Do


Objectives first
Offer a variety of quests
◦ Large & small




Fast turn-around of
assessments
Meaningful rewards
Appropriate rewards
Fit the "game" to the
subject
Don't
Design the 'game' first
 Simply change the
names of things
 Badges for nothing
 Points for nothing
 Gamify everything
 Use your favorite game
as the template

Do's & Don'ts
Part 3: De-Briefing
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5. Can’t go completely flexible:
• Courses still progress linearly, more-or-less.
• There are practical reasons to try and have all students in more
or less the same place at the same time W.R.T. some topics.
Think of the topic outline as the narrative:
• If it were a story; how would it best be told?
Course schedule vs game-based:
• Variety of topics & quests.
• Some quests are tied to specific topics and others are not.
Just like in a game:
• P learn new things and skills as time progresses.
• Some things have pre-reqs.
• Others can be attempted at any time.
Game-based course is mapped out like a storyboard or
concept map rather than linearly as most typical courses
are.
Learning Lessons
Part 3: De-Briefing
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6. Designing a Game
Part 3: De-Briefing
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7. Gamified Course Concept Map
Part 3: De-Briefing
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8. Gives up on the lock-step lessons notion.
• Was never a reality anyways
◦ People are at different stages.
• PROBLEM:
◦ Cannot go completely over to individualized learning.
◦ Simply impractical in many situations.
Each node is like a gamescreen or location.
• Relationships (paths) between nodes are
determined by content rather than time.
There are quests, items, associated with each
node.
Game-Based Course Design
Part 3: De-Briefing
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9. Instructor:






Learner:
Up-Front Design
Ensuring objectives are
addressed.
Competency-Based
Assessment*
Scoring
Records keeping
Marking Load
Taking Ownership of
Learning
 Motivation
 Time Management
 Strategizing


Taking Ownership of
Learning
The Big Challenges
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10. Your Turn
Gamifying the Syllabus (rules); Tasks (Quests); Grading (& Assessment)
Assuming we already have objectives and a syllabus.
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11. Create Quests
Step 1: Design Meaningful Evidence of Competence
Part 4: Your Turn
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12. GRADE & GPA Table
(Used to calculate student grades on the Gradebook sheet)
Score
Letter Grade
GPA
XP
Level
0 - 19
F
0.00
0 - 199
0
20 - 39
F
0.00
200 - 399
1
40 - 49
F
0.00
400 - 499
2
50 - 54
D
1.00
500 - 549
3
55 - 59
D+
1.70
550 - 599
4
60 - 62
C-
1.70
600 - 629
5
63 - 66
C
2.00
630 - 669
6
67 - 69
C+
2.30
670 - 699
7
70 - 72
B-
2.70
700 - 729
8
73 - 76
B
3.00
730 - 769
9
77 - 79
B+
3.30
770 - 799
10
80 - 84
A-
3.70
800 - 849
11
85 - 94
A
4.00
850 - 949
12
95 - 100
A+
4.00
950 - 1000
13
101+
A+
4.00
1001+
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Step 2: Map Scores  XP & Grades  Levels
Part 4: Your Turn
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13. Step 3: Assign XP values to Quests
Part 4: Your Turn
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14. Step 4: Decide on: Options; Flexibility; Achievement Path
Part 4: Your Turn
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15. Step 5: Set Up Scoring Mechanism
Part 4: Your Turn
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16. •
Brands that failed with gamification
http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/32280.asp#singleview
•
Becker, K. (2004). Reconciling a Traditional Syllabus with an Inquiry-Based Introductory Course. The
Journal of Computing Science in Colleges, 20(2), 28-37.
Becker, K. (2006). How much choice is too much? SIGCSE Bull., 38(4), 78-82. doi:
10.1145/1189136.1189176.
Becker, K. (2007). Digital Game Based Learning, Once Removed: Teaching Teachers BRITISH
JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY, SIG-GLUE Special Issue on Game-Based Learning 2007,
38(3), 478-488.
Bogost, I. (2012). Persuasive Games: Exploitationware. Gamasutra. Retrieved from
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/6366/persuasive_games_exploitationware.php
Charles, D., Charles, T., McNeill, M., Bustard, D., & Black, M. (2011). Game-based feedback for
educational multi-user virtual environments. British Journal of Educational Technology, 42(4), 638654. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8535.2010.01068.x.
Deci, E. and Ryan, R. (2004). Handbook of Self-Determination Research. Rochester, NY: University
of Rochester Press.
Deterding, S. (2012). 9.5 Theses on the Power and Efficacy of Gamification. Microsoft Research.
[Microsoft Research Video] Retrieved from
http://research.microsoft.com/apps/video/dl.aspx?id=174677&l=i on 12 October 2012.
Deterding, S., Dixon, D., Khaled, R., & Nacke, L. (2011). From game design elements to
gamefulness: defining "gamification". Paper presented at the Proceedings of the 15th
International Academic MindTrek Conference: Envisioning Future Media Environments, Tampere,
Finland
Kapp, K. M. (2012). The gamification of learning and instruction : game-based methods and
strategies for training and education. San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer.
Nicholson, S. (2012). A User-Centered Theoretical Framework for Meaningful Gamification. Paper
presented at the Games + Learning + Society 8.0, Madison, WI. on June 13
Sheldon, L. (2012). The Multiplayer Classroom : Designing Coursework as a Game. Boston, Mass.:
Course Technology/Cengage Learning.
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Resources
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