Week 7

This week, we looked at the concept of Gamified Learning, using games as a teaching strategy. Harnessing the intrinsic connection between learning and play can majorly benefit student development. We discussed some pioneering companies that have recognized the potential of using games to help with learning, such as Duolingo. They, for example, took the mundane and repetitive process of language acquisition into an exciting journey. Duolingo and other gamification companies leverage a reward system to have their users feel a sense of accomplishment derived from completing challenges. These elements can be integrated into the realm of education to captivate learners and foster a more versatile and engaging learning environment. I myself have been an avid user of Duolingo and have seen it used in the classroom during my Link2Practice sessions. The badges and accomplishment streaks within the game make learning languages more engaging and motivate me more to pick up the app and try for another reward. I especially like using Duolingo to learn a different language than the one I focus on in school. For example, I have studied French and Spanish throughout my formal education, but used Duolingo to learn Korean at the same time. Because it was fun and exciting, I looked forward to learning it simultaneously and didn’t feel overwhelmed. I think I will encourage my future students to do the same and hopefully it can be used to pique their interests in more languages outside of what’s offered in the BC school systems. From my standpoint, I seen gamification as a means to inspire students to become proactive and enthusiastic learners. Learning should inspire and I feel that inspirational learning comes from genuine enjoyment in the material, which is easily accessed through play.

However, it’s important to acknowledge that Gamified Learning isn’t without its obstacles. Budget constraints on teachers makes access to these resources an issue for some teachers, as well as access to technology may prove to be a challenge. Additionally, maintaining healthy competition between students could prove to be an obstacle, as some students don’t take games and light-hearted competition in an appropriate way. Mitigating the challenges of competition could be difficult for some teachers depending on the class demographics.