Gamification in the Classroom Part 2

 GIMKIT

(Fullagar & Kelloway, 2009b)

As I mentioned before in Part 1 on thistopic, Fullagar and Kelloway (2009) did a study on work flow. They found that there are certian characteristics present for when a person gets into a state of state of optimal experience, what I call a feeling similar to a experinceing a high. When you look at the checklist created by Fullagar and Kelloway (2009) and you look at what a video game gives students, you see why video games are so addictive. Karagiorgas and Niemann (2017) made the connection between experiencing the flow at work and the high they get from playing a video game. The games give them immediate feedback, they know exactly what they need to do.  They can lose themselves in the game and become hyper focused to the point where they nothing outside the game distracts them (Fullagar & Kelloway, 2009a).  

I have seen GimKit evoke the same flow that Fullagar and Kelloway (2009) describe in their study. The kids get hyper focused as they get a sense of purpose and like little soldiers carry out the mission no matter what obstacles come their way. I found this video of students playing the game.  Watch how they get into the game, and remember it is based on content they are learning, not just a random game. 

(Petitto, 2019)

When my own students play, you see how they get in the zone, the flow, and get really serious about beating the game and winning.  I want to make sure you make note of something you see in the video.  There is a point in the video where you see two students playing the game on the same Chromebook.  This is important to note because for a student to get in the zone, according to Fullagar and Kelloway (2009), they have to have a balance between skill and challenge.  A student who has never played the game can become unmotivated and not want to play (Karagiorgas & Niemann, 2017).  Pairing up students is one way to overcome this issue.  The more skilled player, helps the unskilled player with making better choices in the game and as such is teaching the unskilled student how to strategize.  My experience with pairing up students in this manner is that eventually the unskilled student wants to play on their own.  

References

Fullagar, C. J., & Kelloway, E. K. (2009a). Flow at work: An experience sampling approach. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 82(3), 595–615. https://doi.org/10.1348/096317908x357903

Fullagar, C. J., & Kelloway, K. E. (2009b). The nine components of the Flow Theory [Article]. In Flow at work: An experience sampling approach.

Karagiorgas, D. N., & Niemann, S. (2017). Gamification and game-based learning. Journal of Educational Technology Systems, 45(4), 499–519. https://doi.org/10.1177/0047239516665105

Petitto, R. (2019). Gimkit: Team play. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d214Zjglqgg