Have you been curious to try to gamify your classroom/office/department/family but don’t know where to start? Here are 3 keys to implement an effective gamification environment.
#1: Find the Why
We’ve all either heard the question or said the question: Why? Why do I have to do that? Children say it when a parent or adult asks them to do something the child doesn’t want to do. Adults say it for the same reasons. Either as a child or an adult, it is the responsibility of the asker to find the motivation for the askee. There are two kinds of motivation: intrinsic and extrinsic. Extrinsic motivation is the “Because I said so” kind of response. The askee does the task out of fear of some kind of punishment. They are the ones that will do the minimum possible to complete the task. Intrinsic motivation is the “I will do it because I want to” kind of response. We call those people self-starters, go-getters, or overachievers. They are the students that go beyond the rubric, or the employee that turns a simple report into a bound, cover-sheeted work of art.
Games do a great job of keeping that engagement because the player is intrinsically motivated to complete the mission or level so they can move on to the next level. There is a quest or journey aspect to further deepen the engagement and motivation. As ubiquitous as Pokémon has become lately, their catch phrase is the epitome of intrinsic motivation: Gotta Catch Em All!
Why do they do this? They are self-motivated. They have found the value in their task and will do it. That’s the goal for any learner, and is much harder in adult learners. As adults we become jaded and busy and don’t have the time or patience to do through a learning cycle like when we were kids. Look around your next professional development you’re at. How many people are on their phones or laptops completely disengaged? The presenter didn’t find their Why and are now checked out for the rest of the session.
#2: Learning Doesn’t Occur in Silos
When developing a professional development plan for a school or business, the major problem most run into is the lack of integration of the PD. Schools are notorious for this. A speaker is brought in to talk about a pedagogical change but there is no follow-up or additional trainings. Teachers stay at the beginner level of the concept and never go deeper. It’s like only teaching your children how to add and subtract. Sure they can do most things, but wouldn’t they have a better understanding of math if you also taught them how to multiply and divide? Let’s not even get started on PEMDAS…
Game developers apply these concepts in their games. Early levels are designed similar to tutorials. To attack do this motion, to defend do a different motion, and special moves are done with this combination. The farther in the game, those basic attacks and defenses become more complicated and intricate. However, by that time the gamer has the experience and schema to adapt the basic movements into more complex movements.
In the classroom or boardroom, this concept is identical. Teachers call it spiraling but the concept is identical to what happens in any video game; one lesson builds on another. However, spiraling tends to only happen within units. Can this happen throughout a semester? Of course. Can it happen cross-curricularly? Absolutely, just with some planning and (GASP!) collaboration. Professional development is done differently in most cases, and unsurprisingly with considerably poor results. To truly have an effective PD plan, learning cannot be unique experiences; it needs developed like a video game where each mission builds on the previous.
#3: Give them a Choice
As a child, I loved reading “Choose Your Own Adventure” books. I had a Justice League one that wore out. For some reason, I usually seemed to choose the path in which the Batmobile broke. Considering that was also the year I broke both wrists on the first day of summer and broke my glasses three times in a two-week period I’d say I was a little cursed that year.
As an adult, I like having a choice for what I want to eat, where I want to work, what I want to do (well, my boys usually dictate that last one). As humans, we like choice. It gives the perception of control that, as adults, we have less and less of.
Games give the user that sense of control and choice. The user chooses which direction to move the character. The user chooses the avatar or the weapon or the conversation. By giving a choice, the gamer has a greater sense of attachment to the task and is intrinsically motivated (hello spiral!) to continue with the task/mission/level.
The same applies to learning. Neil Fleming developed the VARK modalities to differentiate learning styles. He theorized that people’s primary learning style can be broken into four categories: Visual, Auditory, Read/Write, and Kinesthetic. As you may not have all Read/Write or all Auditory learners in one class, giving the students choice in how they learn gives the student the best chance to succeed in the mission (AKA the class assignment). As educators, we want our learners to understand the concept; does it really matter HOW they learn it?
In Closing
Games have a great way of enveloping the user with a world that is not normally experienced in reality. A world filled with choice and authentic skill development that intrinsically motivates the gamer to keep playing and keep mastering the skills. Education can do the same through gamification, but it can’t be done hastily. Using the three keys listed above is a good first step in creating a well-developed gamification program.
Instructional Design by Don Becker 