How to ensure games in schools encourage learning and not just play
16. marts 2022
It’s essential that games in schools become a learning situation compared to exclusively play. Especially three aspects decide whether a game encourages learning.
Games have found their place in schools. Luckily – as it’s without a doubt an effective way to create student engagement. One of the deciding factors for why games function well as a learning tool is that it gives the student a purpose of learning.
No one wants to learn something that doesn’t matter. Especially when you’re at school where everything is about why you must learn all these seemingly insignificant things – and the answer is typically far in the future. This is where games come into play.
Because games make the purpose tangible and relevant for the students in the moment. They start engaging more because they want to win the game. Or they want to hear the next part of the story. Or because they want to build the construction, they’ve collected resources for.
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The teacher needs a significant space
Another important aspect is the teacher’s role. Teachers are an amazing resource – also way more than games will ever be. That’s why it isn’t feasible for teachers to not have the necessary space they need when games become a part of the class. Game-based learning should have the teacher as an integral part of the gameplay.
Klasserumsspil.dk is one of the great examples of exactly that as the teacher is front and center compared to the game. The teachers simply get to take advantage of the game mechanics to create more engagement and an improved learning experience.
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Retaining knowledge takes time
Finally, it’s important that students have time to retain the information, they’re presented through the game. It’s almost impossible to walk away empty-handed if you’re in a well-designed, game-based course for a significant amount of time.
However, it isn’t just about having a game that takes time to complete. It’s more about using the game mechanics to execute the lessons in a naturally engaging way.
Because students need breaks from the game world even though it brings a lot of good. They need to get back to the reality they’re familiar with to properly retain information. Again Klasserumsspil.dk is a brilliant example of this as the games are all multimodal and take place over multiple lessons.
