Gamification at Play
Press “Play”
eLearning is exploding. Since its early beginnings in the mid-1980s it has grown to become a $100B industry worldwide and will cross $300B by 2025. It is relatively easy to set up, allows interactivity, and can deliver educational material on any connected device, worldwide. Most eLearning is delivered linearly, but new methodologies like micro-learning and gamification indicate how it can easily incorporate new innovation and how these new ideas find popularity. Gamification, for example, is now a full-fledged industry, estimated to cross $40B in global revenues by 2024. As it gets adopted widely from the classroom to the boardroom, it is important to understand what Gamification is, and how it should be used to derive maximum learning impact.
We play games voluntarily because they make us happy! It turns out that games are also extremely successful at achieving very high levels of concentration and participation among the players.
“Drink Me”
In the wonderful book “Alice in Wonderland”, Alice falls down a rabbit hole and comes to a room with a tiny door. She wishes loudly that she could be ten inches tall so she could go through that door, and lo-and-behold, a bottle appears before her, with a label that says simply, “drink me”. She checks the bottle to see if it is marked “poison” anywhere, and finding it isn’t, proceeds to drink from the bottle. The taste is strange, but not unpleasant at all, and reminds her of roast turkey and buttered toast.
The Games People Play
A game is like any other consumable item- there has to be an initial hook that motivates people to give it a try. Studies show that voluntary participation is key, otherwise, it may seem like one more thing they have to do, and that leads to quick disengagement . The hook can be anything- the game may appear unexpectedly like a Christmas gift , or it may be something that already has social pressure attached to it, because everyone else is talking about it, or may even make a bold claim- “Play this game and you will master Calculus!”. Whatever it is, the game’s mystery may entice people to begin playing, but it takes more to keep them engaged. In other words, what’s inside the bottle has to match the sense of intrigue the sign creates. It must live up to the promise to be effective and to do that, it must deliver a sense of achievement, competition and fun.
Achievement is an intrinsic motivator. Brain chemistry actually changes when people feel a sense of achievement. Dopamine release creates pleasure, and the release gets bigger as more achievement occurs, making the participant return again and again to the activity providing that sense of achievement. However, the achievement cannot be total. There has to be more to do- another level, another undefeated enemy, another unsolved puzzle which entices the player to keep playing more. Competition works quite differently.
From Games to Learning
Quality- Quality refers to operational aspects of the module that make the playing experience a positive one. These aspects include the UI, gameplay, and proper functionality of all features. A great tip is to tailor the module’s look and feel to the organizational culture where it will be deployed. Pay attention to cultural norms, geographic relevance, and familiar practices. Do insert aspirational features that improve players’ engagement levels like color palettes, stylizations, and characters that are most likely to appeal to the players. Quality is also about the content. Outdated, irrelevant content looks terrible in the modern aesthetic. Information and use cases should be current. Finally, establish “social sharing/acceptance” of the module as one of the KPIs- if your module isn’t getting talked about, nobody will use it, at least not willingly.
Player attributes- Think about the target audience. It is often said gamification in learning primarily appeals to millennials used to mobile devices and video games. That isn’t entirely true. Pay attention to what the target audience will find appealing. However, gamified Learning works best if players have some familiarity with device-based gaming, so consider including a familiarization practice in the client’s organization before rolling out the module. Consider handing out several devices on which the game will be played so players can get used to them, or create a video campaign with small levels of interactivity to get the target audience used to the idea of gamified learning. Then launch the actual module.
Finally, ensure that the learning objectives are closely matched with the game’s features and gameplay. Consider the skills required to succeed at the game, and see if that skill development will help meet the learning objectives. For example, suppose the learning objective is to give new hires preliminary training in sales negotiation. In that case, a candy-crush type game won’t be very useful, but a quest or fantasy type might be. Also, consider secondary learning objectives. For example, a school may want to provide math and reading practice through a game. However, if the gameplay relies almost entirely on narration, then the game designers have lost a chance to get the players to learn to read to extract relevant information!
The Missing Pieces
eLearning Gamification is not a panacea. For instance, several surveys show gamified learning doesn’t always improve learning. Therefore, it is important to remember that gamification, like books, is a tool- just one of many that work in concert with each other to improve the result of the training effort. Rather, it is designed to improve engagement in students so they are more receptive to what is being taught. Thus, it is useful to think of modern learning as “blended learning”- making a lesson game-centric, for example, allows a teacher to step back and become a mentor on students’ journeys of self-discovery. Corporate training about POSH, for instance, or disaster relief training is not suitable for games with “fun” elements, as they need to be handled with sensitivity. However, simulations can be used in training.
Know your audience and your motivation: We have talked about this before, but considering how many gamification initiatives fail because of poor matching we think it is important we mention it again: Don’t design a gamified eLearning module unless you know who is going to use it! Also, don’t gamify a module just because it is “the thing to do”
