In this submission choose either a unit or module or your course to describe the following. How does a student win in your course or your unit/module of study. How do they ‘beat’ the unit or course? What 5 (or whatever the number) things must they do to collect the badge or slay the dragon? How might you create ‘levels’ so that students will know that they are progressing through your course? Can you write learning objectives for your course or unit/module that reflect this? How can you make the ‘win’ engaging or interesting?
10 Bonus Points: Read another player’s post and reply.
10 Bonus Points: For including in your submission objectives that are written as part of your “game.”
Earn the Already a Player for describing how you already do this in your class.
Charla
Robin
Val
Lee
Marian
Ann
Dave
Mary
I do my chapters as units and try to do a chapter a week and each week there is homework, a quiz, homework questions and a lab and write-up. It’s a lot to keep up with but I have specific days of the week when each are due so they know in advance what to expect. I have some that hand in material a day or 2 late and I always say I will deduct points unless they tell me ahead of time and have a good reason. I rarely deduct points. I guess I could reward those that turn material in on time. I wonder if there is a way to automatically assign points or a badge if they do get it in on time. I look forward to hearing from anyone about this.
You could add an adjacent column in the grade center called Timing (or something along those lines) and just manually add in extra points after the deadline for those that turned in submissions. You just wouldn’t be able to delay on that task. I personally do not like to reward people for doing something they should be doing anyway. I do grade in the order received so sometimes I think that is an incentive because they know they will have to wait until later if they are at the end of the line. I also posted yesterday that I offer a 24-hour grace period for all assignments but that is not really conducive to badges. Let’s see what other ideas come up! Thanks for the post!
In terms of “levels”, in BA490 Political and Social Environment of Business I currently break my 15-week course down into three 5-week modules. I assign participation grades by module and have a major assignment due at the end of each one, too. I use a scaffolding approach so each assignment builds on each other so the final project is the culmination of all of those reports together into one comprehensive report that allows them to demonstrate mastery and “win”.
In terms of applying these gamification ideas, I think I could turn the course topics (about 15 or so) into “badges” and require that they earn three per module with a goal of accumulating 9 by the end of the semester to “slay the dragon”. That application idea wasn’t as hard to come up with as I had initial thought… fun!
SAMPLE OBJECTIVES:
In this course, you will have the opportunity to progress through three levels as you attempt to demonstrate your mad ninja skills for sustainability and to master the relationship between business and society. Within each level, you will have the opportunity to earn “badges” that show you know the subject matter inside and out (e.g. stakeholder approach, corporate governance, crises management, business ethics, regulation, consumer stakeholders, community stakeholders, natural environment stakeholders, employe stakeholders) . Anyone that successful completes nine badges by the end of the semester wins the title of “Corporate Citizen of the Year”!
HOW NOT TO DO IT:
Top 10 Most Frustrating Video Game Levels:
I can see how I could reorganize my course for teachers into an effort to survive the cold water first for themselves (learning the material and skills) and then for their community of students (how to tecah the material effectively to their students). It would add an edge to the course and might be fun.
Hi Marian! I am not sure if this relates or not but since you mentioned water and survival skills, this app may be of interest to you to help brainstorm additional application ideas pertaining to gamification:
SAI FAH – THE FLOOD FIGHTER
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/sai-fah-the-flood-fighter/id811035426?mt=8
DESCRIPTION:
Sai Fah The Flood Fighter is the world’s first flood preparedness education game! Take lead in the upcoming revolution of education through the power of gamification and bring your surviving skills to the next level while enjoying a dynamic game.
Thanks, Carla. Since I teach teachers this might be something to have them look at. At the moment the site is being updated so I can’t access it, but I note it and will check later.
I will use the course I just taught on Understanding by Design (UbD) as an example. Learning outcomes in Understanding by Design model include knowledge, skills, understandings and transfer. Understandings are often how one selects and uses the knowledge and skills; and transfer is the application of the knowledge, skills and understanding in a different context. So, 4 badges, not 5, to slay this particular dragon. Those are levels in one dimension – learning outcomes.
For the unit design project in the class, there are 3 “levels”: learning outcomes, assessments, and learning activities. We worked first on the learning outcomes, but revisited and revised as we worked on assessments and learning activities. The development of these three is not necessarily linear, so there could be badges for each one – though without the learning outcomes, it’s difficult to do the others.
In the course of developing a unit using the UbD template, we started out with a draft unit sketch: it was refined and revisited. The final product was a completed UbD template for the learning unit. There are definitely levels here, too, that could be badged.
So, as I reflect on level of achievement, I realize that they can be multi-modal and even somewhat overlapping, as they were in this example.
Hi Lee – I think the badge options for learning outcomes, assessments, learning activities, and final product are perfect as you have described. Also, maybe there could be levels if knowledge & skills were grouped together for Level 1. Then Understanding could be Level 2 (since you need knowledge & skills to get to this point). Then Transfer could be Level 3 (since you need knowledge, skills and understanding to get to this point). I may be misguided without fully understanding the content but I thought I would just throw that out there for your consideration. You could also look at the badges on this Faculty Challenge game for additional ideas (maybe specific to the the quality, frequency, timing and creativity of the other badges). What do you think?