EDITORIAL | 7
THE APPLICATION OF GAMES IN HIGHER EDUCATION
game to function whilst maintaining the interest of the player are
referred to as play mechanics but equally as important are the
interaction of the players (dynamics), and their emotional state
(Robson et al., 2015). By using a few of these play mechanics it is
possible to ‘gamify’ a session, in which the material being taught is
the same but the way it is presented or tested is in game form; this is
known as Game Enhanced Learning (GEL). It may be unfair to apply
games in assessment which determines summative grades but the
learning process itself is well suited to this dynamic by allowing the
student to engage with stimulating activities, visually track their
progress, and become more confident with the material they are
learning.
This approach encourages creativity in the academic and depending
on the individual, they may create and implement entirely new ideas
or simply use facilities such as Quizlet in order to begin to introduce
gamification within their teaching. Understanding the key criteria of
games can help promote GEL sessions and therefore in order to use
games to teach, first we must learn what games can teach us.
References
Deterding, S., Dixon, D., Khaled, R., & Nacke, L. (2011, September).
From game design elements to gamefulness: defining gamification.
In Proceedings of the 15th international academic MindTrek
conference: Envisioning future media environments, 9-15.
Dichev, C., Dicheva, D., Angelova, G., & Agre, G. (2014). From
gamification to gameful design and gameful experience in learning.
Cybernetics and Information Technologies, 14(4), 80-100.
Hannify, B. (2012). Historical Adventures: Newcomer Teacher
Invents Educational Role-Playing Game. Available at: http://www.
technapex.com/2012/07/historical-adventures-newcomer-teacherinvents-educational-role-playing-game/
McGonigal, J. (2011). Reality is Broken. London: Vintage
Michael, D. R., & Chen, S. L. (2005). Serious games: Games that
educate, train, and inform. Boston: Course Technology.
Robson, K., Plangger, K., Kietzmann, J. H., McCarthy, I., & Pitt, L.
(2015). Is it all a game? Understanding the principles of gamification.
Business Horizons, 58(4), 411-420.