It’s NOT Too Late to Sign-up!!

We hope that you had a great Thanksgiving and are ready for the 10 Day Faculty Challenge! Go ahead, take the plunge and sign up now! The first challenge will open today and it’s an easy one, so don’t worry if you can’t get started until later. In fact, there are so many ways to earn points, even starting tomorrow you’sign upll be fine.

Be a player! Join us for 10 days of fun!

Fill out this short form to register, or click on the Sign Up Free image. Our challenge will take place inside of a WordPress blog so we’ll need your email to invite you to create an account and join our blog.

Even registering to play gets you extra points! Really!!

 

 

Photo credit: istockphoto.com/newartgraphics

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Your FLC team will be taking Thursday and Friday off, so we wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving to all of you early! Please enjoy a little Thanksgiving humor below.

Click for Thanksgiving Fails

Monday the 10 Day Faculty Challenge GAME will launch. We really hope you’ll join us and play along. Have you registered yet? You get bonus points for registering BEFORE Monday, so please sign up NOW! The game will run from December 1 – December 12, Monday through Friday. REGISTER HERE

Here are a few reasons that we think you shouldn’t miss out:

1- Playing games may slow down and perhaps even reverse brain deterioration.

2- Games make you more creative.

3- People who play together, stay together!

4. We need players. Games are more fun when you are playing with and/or against someone.

5. Start your day with an adrenaline surge, a smile and a little competition. You’ll save money on caffeine! Have we convinced you yet?  REGISTER HERE

6. You know you waste at least 10 minutes every day doing something silly on the Internet. Waste it with us instead! You may learn something while you are at it, and have fun too! AND BONUS BONUS — you may be able to incorporate some of the strategies into your classroom!

7. Kids, celebrities and geeks play games. Try it, you might like it!!

8. There are NO right and wrong answers in our game. The ‘rightness’ of an answer depends on you and your response and what’s best for your classroom.

9. College is a time for EXPERIMENTING. Come experiment in our safe environment.

10. COME ON, we need you! If we build it, will they come? Please join us!

REGISTER HERE

Register NOW for the GAME

It’s time to register for the 10 Day Faculty Challenge “Game” — yup it’s a game. Notice the countdown timer at the right? The game begins at 8 AM on Monday, December 1. You need to register to play.

We’re going all out, leaderboards, timer, join us!! Karl Kapp (see previous posts) talked a lot about what infusing gamification strategies might add to your course, so we’re hoping you’ll play with us starting December 1 for ten days. It won’t take a lot of your time, we promise, and we hope you’ll have fun. But you must register so we can add you to the game website.

REGISTER HERE

Are you interested in getting a sneak peek at what the game looks like? Click behind the curtain and we’ll show you just a few highlights.

Click for details

Register NOW and earn extra points! Don’t delay. Even if you don’t normally play games, this is a game you can play and have fun, or your money back!  Oh yeah, it’s FREE!!

REGISTER HERE
 

 

Photo credit: istockphoto.com/Sergey Nivens

10 Day Faculty Challenge

sign upThanks to all of you who were able to attend our Games vs Gamification webinar, and most of all, thank you Karl Kapp for giving us such a persuasive argument for implementing some gamification strategies in our classes. I thought Karl really showcased some win-wins for when these two worlds (gaming and education) deliberately collide. If you missed the session you can listen to the recording.

So now, as promised we’d like you to sign up for the 10 Day Faculty Challenge. The challenge starts on Monday, December 1 and will run for 10 days (Monday-Friday for two weeks).

Fill out this short form to register! Our challenge will take place inside of a WordPress blog so we will need your WordPress ID, and if you aren’t a WordPress user, we’ll need your email to invite you to create an account and join our blog. It sounds harder than it is! Just click on the Sign Up Free image to complete our simple form.

The challenge starts first thing on Monday. You will not have access to the game site until Monday morning 6 AM.
 

Photo credit: istockphoto.com/newartgraphics

Games vs Gamification in Higher Education

Registration will close this morning (Monday) at 9 AM so be sure to follow the link here to send us your registration information so we can get you the webinar information in time.

Please register soon to attend the webinar. And, please spread the word to your colleagues.

We’re very excited to have Karl Kapp join us to present today’s webinar. We hope you can join us. I’ve linked Karl’s website icon with his YouTube video library. Feel free to browse.

Browse video library

Fried Friday: Gamifying Education

It’s not too late to sign up for Karl Kapp’s short presentation on Games vs. Gamification. Join us at 11 AM on Monday the 24th to learn more about the gamification of education and how you might improve your student’s engagement and interest in your course topic. Karl Kapp of Bloomsburg University is the author of the Gamification of Learning and Instruction and an expert on the topic. We are very lucky to have him join us via Collaborate on Monday.

Registration will close Monday morning at 9 AM so be sure to follow the link here to send us your registration information so we can get you the webinar information in time.

Please register today to attend the webinar. And, please spread the word to your colleagues.

Each Friday we usually like to leave you with lighter, less brain heavy information. So, in that tradition, here’s an Extra Credits video on Gamifying Education. I think it hits a lot of interesting points which will tie in nicely with Karl’s talk on Monday. Click the image below to view.

Click for Video

As always, we love to hear your comments. Have fun with our last post and the Pluck the Turkey Game and don’t forget, next week we’ll be pre-registering for our 10 Day Faculty Challenege Game that starts December 1st. Keep your eyes open for more details!

Register NOW for Monday’s Webinar with Karl Kapp!!!

We’re excited to announce that Karl Kapp, author of The Gamification of Learning and Instruction, will be helping us kick off two exciting weeks of challenges (a game!) by speaking with us on Monday, November 24, at 11 AM. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to join Karl and discuss the difference between gaming and gamification in education. Please register today to attend the webinar. And, please spread the word to your colleagues.

Click to Begin GameWe invite you to play our new game. We created this Pluck the Turkey game (Nicole’s done a masterful job at making this game fun and engaging don’t you think?) so that you’d be ready for Karl’s webinar on Monday and so that you’d have a fun way of learning or reinforcing your learning about games and the gamification of education.

Before trying the game please review our first two posts on gamification, dated November 10th and November 17th. Then, once you think you understand gamification, start the game by clicking on the image at the left. (Hmm, I’ll bet you’ve told students to review your lecture material before taking your quiz too, with mixed results!)

Please comment and let us know what you think of game! Did it help you to understand gamification? Did you save Thanksgiving?

Tech Tuesday – Your Turn

graphic

This week we’d like you to share a tech tip! Do you have a tech tool, a method, or a shortcut that makes your teaching more efficient or effective? Have you found a fun app or add-on that you enjoy using? If so, please share in the comments below!

 

 

Photo credit: istockphoto.com/alashi

Gamification of Learning: Part 2

Part 2: The Elements of Gamification

Click for examplesIn our first post we explored a little bit about the importance of games historically and their relationship to learning. The Nobel Prize website has some wonderful educational games and videos that might give you an idea of some well-designed and educationally challenging gaming examples.

The gamification of education is more about the elements of games than the game itself. In other words, when you analyze a game that you really are addicted to or really liked as a child, what made it fun? What made you return to play the game more than once? What was the challenge? What was it that hooked you? When we talk about the gamification of learning, we’re going to be talking about the game design principles and interactive elements that we might want to include in our classes to enhance or transform the educational experience. Karl Kapp writes that “Game-based learning can turn disconnected, bored learners into engaged participants.”

Click to read postFirst of all, let’s be clear. Has everyone drunk the gaming cool-aide? Does everyone think that gamification is a good idea? Absolutely not! You might want to read Jeff Watson’s “Gamification: Don’t say it, don’t do it, just stop” to see another side of the gamification issue. I think though, before you fold up your arms and say, you don’t have to follow this new educational flavor-of-the-week trend, you should understand it. In other words, as I always told my kids, say ‘no’ to dancing because you don’t want to dance, not because you don’t know how to dance. Ready to jump in and learn more about gamification?

Here is a simple guide to some aspects of games that can apply to education. More details can be found in Kapp’s book The Gamification of Learning and Instruction and his collaboratively authored book Gamification of Learning and Instruction Fieldbook.

Rules: All games have rules. In the educational environment these rules will tie to your learning objectives. These rules lead students to the desired learning. Effectively, the rules guide students to the learning objectives. There are also rules of engagement which may include behavioral norms and boundaries. These rules will guide students to understanding what behaviors are permitted and which will not be tolerated.

For the Win: All games have a purpose or a reason for playing. Whether the goal of the game is to score 100 points, or rescue the princess, or get 3 x’s in a row, games have a clearly defined win. Gamers refer to this as FTW (for the win). In education we call these our objectives or sometimes they are a set of skills that students must attain.

Motivation: Not all game players play games for the same reason. Richard Bartle has described the four main player types based on their motivation for engaging in play. There are “Achievers” who want to win. These are your students who will rise to a challenge and do best when they can see how other players are doing. They like to be number one. There are “Socializers” who will stop to help another player. These are your students who share ideas and links and comments with other students. These are those students who make teams operate more smoothly. There are “Explorers” who love to discover the clues. These students will create new content, finding links to share with the class. They will go out of their way to bring new information or uncover new data.They click everywhere just in case you’ve hidden information someplace. Finally, there are the “Killers” who will cheat or hack their way through the game. These students like to take short-cuts and do whatever it takes to finish or complete the assignment. They don’t particularly care how other students are doing, they enjoy stepping over others on their way up. In fact, often, for the “killer” it isn’t about winning, it is about making others lose.

Skill Levels: Most games have very easy entry levels to teach the game and the rules to novice players. You do not want to discourage people from playing your game. However, as much as you want to attract and retain these novice players, you also want to challenge players who understand the game and the environment. In education we refer to this as differentiated instruction. Keeping your top learners engaged without disenfranchising those who need more support.

Challenges: Games are all about challenges, or obstacles to overcome. They are all about the story. Fulfill the quest, save the princess and kill the dragon along the way. Research has shown that facts are learned better when they are embedded into a story rather than delivered as a bulleted list. But, the story should be simple and make sense and be relevant to the learning. One of the biggest mistakes that educational games make is to create a storyline that overpowers the learning or obscures the learning.

Learn from Failure: Gamers often lose, yet they usually jump right back into the game and try again. Built into failure is a strong incentive to try again. In games you learn from your mistakes. There may be a fine line between frustration and fun, but failure itself rarely makes a person quit play and rather often acts as a strong incentive to try again.

Scoring: Whether we’re talking about badges, points, or leader boards, games usually have a powerful build-in incentives to reward players. Often, these points, or badges accumulate throughout the game, much like a student’s points add up to a final grade at the end of the semester. In some social games, users are sent an email with digital awards letting the player know they’ve met a milestone.

Timing: Games usually have specified ending that is tangible and achievable. Often a progress bar will denote how much time or how many challenges you have yet to complete. With games, it often takes many attempts or many failures to achieve success. Failure is not considered a bad event, it is just part of the learning process. One notable characteristic described by gamers is getting lost in the game and losing a sense of time. They describe themselves as immersed or absorbed totally in the game. That’s a description that every educator would love students to be remarking about their content. Time can also be used as a reward or incentive to keep engaged. When reaching a certain level, the player or student is rewarded with additional time to continue the play.

Feedback: Built into almost every game is feedback. When a character encounters a challenge and makes the wrong choice, something happens and the player learns from that feedback to avoid that situation in the future. Feedback is usually a powerful incentive to try again and learn from the mistakes of previous attempts. Rewards are feedback. Grades are feedback. Attaching immediate feedback to actions is pivotal to keeping engagement alive.

Fun: Fun is important but should not drive the decision to gamify education. Most games and most learning can be designed and delivered to be both fun and engaging. A big mistake, however, is to be so consumed with the element of fun that the element of learning is forgotten. Always remember what the educational goals are that are trying to be met and don’t allow the game aspects to obscure those learning objectives.

istock photo credit: nickpo

Fried Friday: Gameshow Contestants ARE the “Weakest Link”

Have you ever called on one of your students for the answer to a question only to have them blurt out something totally bizarre? Or, has it happened to you while playing Trivial Pursuits(TM) or some other game with friends? Sometimes when we’re put into the spotlight, our brains seem to freeze and we are shocked by how stupid we momentarily become.

Since we’re spotlighting gamification in the next few weeks, we thought our Fried Friday post should show the lighter side of games and gameshow responses. We hope you enjoy this collection of Best of Stupid Game Show Answers.

You Tube on Game Shows Click Here