Implementation

Dear Maja Pivec, I am concerned about the matter of the structural design of educational games and very pleased to have the chance to ask an expert: how should the game be designed to make sure that the learner does not avoid some important educational contents by cheating?
Ginasper (France)

How to avoid cheating? The game should, in the first place, be fun to play – and the interaction in the game should be more rewarding than the completion of the game itself.

Where is the guarantee that students won’t cheat? There is no guarantee. Also, in commercial games, cheat codes are available and popular. Cheat codes are included in the game to allow the developers to test and debug their code without having to play for hours to test enhancement. For example, a driving game may have a cheat code to repair damage, or a shooter may have a cheat code for unlimited ammunition. This allows the developer to test without having to be an expert at the game. These codes always find themselves posted on the Internet and are usually found by players wanting to experience the game in an easier mode.

When designing your own game, it is always a challenge to ensure that the game is linear enough to cover all aspects for learning, yet not so linear that it would restrict players’ further gameplay if they got stuck.

I can see that a video game is of great advantage to help integrate schools in the new digital era. But, for students, can you tell us in which way video games improve children's potential?
finateca (United Kingdom)

Many publications include research that details potential aspects of player computer games. For example, hand-eye coordination, spatial orientation, mental rotation, spatial visualisation (Tetris achieves these), spatial integration and mental mapping (3d maze games), strategies for dividing attention and multitasking (fps games), brain capacity improvement, problem solving, etc.

The games to train site is one of many sites where learning or training games for different topics are listed.

Dear Maja Pivec, I believe that games contribute to the creativity of learners. Do you think that creativity is important for the learning process? Could you give us some examples of these game-based learning projects? Thanks in advance.
Marta Casares (Spain)

Creativity is a basis for learning and forms many of the constructivist learning theories. Gardner, a professor at Harvard Graduate School of Education, suggested that individuals are “creative” in specific domains. He suggested that providing students with ways to be creative allows them to find and solve problems and communicate ideas in various forms. Game-based learning is ideal for this. Some examples are described in Piloting New Ways of Learning and Education Arcade zooms in on games in the classroom.

There is a recent EU-funded project on the application of mobile phones and games for learning called mGBL – mobile Game-Based Learning.

Malcolm Gladwell, a writer at the New Yorker, said about the programme Sesame Street: “If you can hold the attention of children, you can educate them.” Do you agree? Do you believe that this could also be applied to adults?
Pedro González (Spain)

I also believe that attention and focus on the topic are necessary for successful learning. However, there are other factors that influence and contribute to the learning process, e.g. arousing interest in the topic, interaction with the topic, etc., where games can be applied as a tool to foster various aspects of the life-long learning process. There are also many publications on immersive environments. Research shows that 3d games can create such an environment and that, when immersed, the player’s cognitive learning abilities are increased.

Games, play and playful interaction can successfully be introduced in all areas of (adult) learning, i.e. formal, non-formal and informal learning.

Dear Maja, thanks for answering our questions. Do you think that game-based learning helps the learning process to take place out of the classrooms as well, for example, at home? And do you believe that collaborative learning is possible in this type of learning? For instance, three children playing together with a videogame.
Octavio Giacomo (Italy)

Many multiplayer games achieve exactly this. Dungeon Siege One is a good example. Each player controls a different character and, in multiplayer mode, they must work together to complete tasks and advance levels. This promotes teamwork and fosters collaboration between children. Multiplayer online games also foster collaboration with many players participating solely for the social interaction.

Are there any examples of this kind of learning in Europe or in other countries in the world?
andersdansk (Denmark)

There are many examples of the application of games for learning in different areas.

One can decide to use “educational games” for learning e.g. Chemicus (by Heureka-Klett publisher; or TIVOLA for the US market), a puzzle-adventure game for the self-directed learning of chemistry. One can find an entire series of titles similar to Chemicus, e.g. Physicus, Hystorion, Informaticus, etc., by the same publishers.

One can also apply off-the-shelf games that cover various aspects of the learning issue, e.g.: Age of Empires for the introduction of ancient history, Jurassic Park covers the topic of dinosaurs, SimEarth or SimCity can be applied for ecology and resource management, The Sims is for social and behavioural sciences, etc., as outlined in the Edge Magazine Oct. 2004, issue 141.

There are also online games available. Several online games and case studies can be seen at the UniGame site.

I am the founder of the Kindersite project. Please could you evaluate the Kindersite within the format of game-based learning?
joelhjosephson (United Kingdom)

The SIG-GLUE quality stamp service is aimed at assessing the quality of learning games. The service started in May 2006. Individuals and companies can submit their learning games for an evaluation process. The term “learning games” is used for games that have an explicit learning purpose and can be used, adapted and adopted for supporting, improving and fostering learning processes within formal, non-formal and informal learning scenarios.

Access the web site to see more details about criteria, submission, the evaluation process and benefits of the quality stamp.

Dear Maja, I'm very interested in games for learning, in order to support constructivist learning. Do you know an interesting software tool for making games? Thank you very much.
anamv (Uruguay)

“Gamemaker” is a good example. It has a free version and a registered version with many tutorials included.

For the more experienced, there is “torque” from garagegames. This is a commercial engine with 2d and 3d versions, as well as an educational pricing structure.

Both products are very good and produce good quality output; however, you still need to foster the idea and develop the gameplay design before you start.

I read an article that stated that game-based learning is negative because children get used to working in unreal situations (fun, games) that will not be the case when children grow up and work in a company. What do you think?
Lucie Smith (Ireland)

Despite having fun and playful interaction in games (though I personally don’t see why fun and play should exclude learning) games can cover different learning objectives and contribute to various learning outcomes that can also be applied in the professional world.

For example, when playing multiplayer games, the social aspects of these can contribute to the acquisition of numerous skills relevant to professional life, e.g. team work, communication skills, digital literacy, etc. Also, today, many digital games do provide a real-life situation. Simcity is a classic and often used to teach economics. Microsoft’s Flight Simulator is also true to life. Achieving a balance between fun, gameplay and learning is a goal that many developers have yet to achieve.

Additional information:

Online Educa Berlin 2006 organises a round table discussion about the purpose of games in learning, quality issues and theoretical foundations of games design and development on Friday, December 1. To read more please click here.

Call for Papers: SIG-GLUE Special Issue on Game-Based Learning - British Journal of Educational Technology. The SIG-GLUE editorial board would like to invite researchers, practitioners and game-developers interested in the use, or potential use, of games in adult educational settings to contribute to this special issue with articles reporting original research and current developments in the area of game-based learning. To read more please see the PDF on the right-hand side resource area.

First of its kind

ICT has been introduced into the Nordic schools during the last 10-20 years. While many studies have analysed how and how often ICT is used in schools, hardly any studies have taken this analysis to the next level: What is the impact of ICT?

The inter-Nordic study E-learning Nordic 2006 focuses on the impact of ICT on education within three key areas:

• Pupil performance
• Teaching and learning processes
• Knowledge-sharing, communication and home-school co-operation.

ICT has a positive impact on the schools’ overall target

E-learning Nordic 2006 shows that ICT has a positive impact on the schools’ overall target – improving the pupils’ learning. However, the study also shows that the full potential of ICT is not being fully realized in many schools. Teachers are mostly focused on using ICT to support the subject content. Still, a positive impact of ICT on teaching is also seen on pupil engagement, differentiation, creativity and less waste of time. The study also shows that the preconditions for using ICT for knowledge sharing, communication and school-home co-operation are at hand, and ICT is indeed being used for this in many schools. However the positive impact of this is as yet only moderate.

Real life example: At Oslo Montessori Skole (a primary school in Norway) it is assessed that ICT specifically has an impact on pupils with special needs in the area of writing and reading. It is the school’s experience that ICT has been a valuable tool to support the concentration and motivation among this group of pupils.

Impact of ICT on Pupil Performance

The teachers assess that the impact of ICT is strongest on the pupils’ subject-related performance. However, a positive impact can also be seen on learning basic skills such as reading and writing. 60% of the teachers reported that they experience a moderate or high degree of positive impact of ICT on the pupils’ writing skills.

Also, teachers experience that ICT support differentiation both challenging the academically strong pupils in new ways or supporting the academically weak pupils so that they can more easily participate on equal terms with other pupils. Many teachers find that it is easier to differentiate their teaching with ICT than without.

Real life example: At Mörbyskolan (a primary school in Sweden) the pupils really like that they can manage their own learning to a much greater degree when using ICT. From the point of view of the teachers’ at Mörbyskolan, the computer is not seen as replacing the teacher, but supporting the pupils in new ways to be able, to a larger extent, to work in their own way.

Impact of ICT on Teaching and Learning Processes

Results from E-learning Nordic 2006 show that ICT generally has a positive impact on the teaching and learning situation. However, some people expected that ICT could in some ways revolutionise the teaching and learning processes at school, and compared with this view, the impact must be seen as more limited. ICT does not revolutionize teaching methods. The teachers are mostly focused on using ICT to support the subject content. However, the impact of integrating ICT in teaching can be measured in pupil engagement, differentiation and creativity.

It has been stated in the public debate – in for example Denmark – that a barrier to the integration of ICT has been that too much teaching time is wasted. The results of the study cannot support this argument, since the great majority of teachers do not experience that more teaching time is wasted with the integration of ICT.

Real life example: Oulun Lyseon Lukio (a secondary school in Finland), is a school with an advanced use of ICT. The teachers at the school emphasise, however the importance of that the focus remains on the subject of teaching itself. The choice to use ICT tools in education must be based on a sound analysis of whether the use actually can bring another dimension to the learning process.

Impact of ICT on Knowledge Sharing, Communication and school-home co-operation

E-learning Nordic 2006 shows that the use of ICT as an organizational tool has not yet fully matured. The preconditions for using ICT for knowledge-sharing, communication and school-home co-operation are at hand, and many schools, teachers, pupils and parents use the ICT infrastructure for informational and collaborative purposes. However, in spite of massive ICT-based communication within the teaching staff at many schools, the positive impact on co-operation and knowledge sharing is as yet only moderate.

Real life example: At Greve Gymnasium (a secondary school in Denmark), the headmaster finds that knowledge-sharing is not necessarily easier with ICT, but as the complexity of the school organisation and the management of daily activities increases, ICT is the only way to handle the intensified complexity.

Strategic challenges

The study shows that the potential of ICT is not being fully realized at all schools. To address this problem E-learning Nordic 2006 offers a number of recommendations for the future. A special key concern is the need for more focus on organizational implementation of ICT. If the potential impact of ICT in Nordic schools is to be further realised, school owners and management need to be more professional in their organisational implementation of ICT. Substantial investments in ICT have been made at both regional and local level, but often with no clear criteria for success and no structured monitoring of the benefits. At many schools, the situation can be compared to buying 10 new laptops and not un-wrapping them. For example, during the last few years a number of schools have invested in Learning Management Systems (LMS) with the ambition of improving education and knowledge-sharing. However, often the investments have not been accompanied by use of the new systems. Return on investment from ICT investments and ICT projects require a commitment to organisational implementation on the part of the school management. They must be visionary enough to initiate and continuously support the use of ICT as a strategic tool for developing the general ambitions of the school.

Fact sheet

The E-learning Nordic 2006 study has been designed and launched as a partnership between the Finnish National Board of Education, the Swedish National Agency for School Improvement, the Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research, the Danish Ministry of Education, and Ramboll Management.

Data collection in the study was based on an internet-based survey conducted among 224 schools in Finland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark as well as 12 on-site school visits. More than 8000 persons participated in the survey. Respondents were pupils in the 5th and 8th grades in primary school and the 11th grade in secondary school, teachers in these grades, the pupils parents, as well as the headmasters at the participating schools.

Studying impact is methodologically difficult. The method chosen was to ask different key participants in Nordic schools about their personal experiences using ICT and their assessment of the impact of ICT. This methodology does not necessarily prove a direct link between the use of ICT and learning impact, but it uncovers the impact as it is perceived by the headmasters, teachers, pupils and the pupils’ parents.

Authors:

• Ella Kiesa from the Finnish National Board of Education,
• Peter Karlberg from the Swedish National Agency for School Improvement,
• Øystein Johannesen from the Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research,
• Lilla Voss from the Danish Ministry of Education, and
• Sanya Pedersen at Ramboll Management.

eLearning and Virtual Universities

At the height of the dotcom bubble Peter Drucker predicted that “universities won’t survive … as residential institutions” (The Guardian, April 13, 2004), and others, along the same lines, foresaw that universities would become content providers and learning facilitators to for-profit producers of “learningware”.

In the late nineties, several US universities formed commercial companies alone or in collaboration with other universities, cultural institutions and providers of e-solutions. Among others, New York University invested $20m in NYU Online and Columbia University formed Fathom together with 14 universities, libraries and museums, using $40m. None of these ever launched an e-learning course. At the same time, Cornell University invested $12m in eCornell without registering any significant numbers of students. Also, the attempt by the Open University of the UK to deliver education on the US marked failed with a loss of approximately $20m.

One of the few successful e-learning providers in the USA is University of Phoenix, and its success seems to be related to a focus on a limited and specialised market in the business and health field.

At the same time, in Europe, the European Council adopted a grand scale plan called Europe. An Information Society for All (Lisbon, March 2000) with the goal of becoming ‘the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world’ by 2010. In May the same year, the European Commission published a communication entitled e-Learning – Designing tomorrow’s education.

Parallel to these political initiatives, but without coordination from the European Commission, many national European projects for e-learning were launched, e.g. the UK e-University, the Digital University in the Netherlands, the Bavarian Virtual University, the Virtual University in Finland and the Net-University in Sweden.

Five years later, the UKeU has ceased operations. What was launched as a worldwide 21st century successor of the Open University never attracted financial support from commercial partners and recruited only 900 students at a time when 5000 were expected. £60m of public money was spent on the operation.

The Dutch Digital University - a consortium of universities in the Netherlands together with some it-companies and publishers - is still in operation, but the volume is in no way significant, and partners are considering withdrawing.

The Finnish Virtual University and the Swedish Net-University – both government-run initiatives - have increased their amount of online courses, trying to recruit students from other institutions and regions in the country, but the expected inter-institutional collaboration is still missing.

At the Bavarian Virtual University, also a government initiative, the amount of courses offered as e-learning and available for students from all institutions in Bavaria has been successfully achieved, but with no side effects along the lines of improved inter-institutional collaboration.

The most important lesson learned from these European virtual university and e-learning experiences is that none of the initiatives have reached a level of sustainability – they will not survive if government support is withdrawn.

Considerations regarding eLearning development

In his presentation at the eLearning Conference in Brussels in May 2005, Fabrizio Cardinali from Giunti Interactive Labs, Italy, characterised e-Learning the development in the late nineties as ‘the big wave of e-learning’, and the development at the start this century as ‘the Tsunami of e-learning’.

Nevertheless, in a report published as early as 2001, the OECD spotted the difficulties of implementing e-learning: "In spite of having spent US$ 16 billion in 1999 in OECD countries on ICT, there is (…) no clear evidence that ICT investments made by the public sector have resulted in improved performance of teachers and/or learners, nor that it has improved the quality and access to educational resources on the scale predicted.” (E-Learning. The Partnership Challenge, 2001, p. 24).

Recently, another OECD report entitled E-learning in Tertiary Education. Where do we stand?, published in 2005, has elaborated on the same problem:

“e-learning has not really revolutionized learning and teaching to date. Far-reaching, novel ways of teaching and learning, facilitated by ICT, remain nascent or still to be invented. (…) The adoption of learning management systems (LMS) (…) appears to be one of the prominent features of e-learning development in the tertiary education worldwide. (…) The current immaturity of online learning is demonstrated by low adoption of content management systems (…). ICT has penetrated tertiary education, but has had more impact on administrative services (e.g. admissions, registration, fee payment, purchasing) than on the pedagogic fundamentals of the classroom.” (p. 14-15)

Although the reports express scepticism regarding the integration of ICT in tertiary teaching and learning, they also stress a general confidence in the use of educational technology. The first one gives an analysis of the situation that points to technology fixation and lack of cultural specificities as the main cause for the absence of success in e-learning:

“Technology alone does not deliver educational success. It only becomes valuable in education if learners and teachers can do something useful with it. (…) educational content and e-learning services (…) need to be tailored to local needs and cultures." (E-Learning. The Partnership Challenge, 2001, p. 24-25).

In the British debate following the collapse of the UKeU in 2004, the national funding council explained with a certain degree of bitterness that the lack of interest in e-learning was caused by universities focusing on ‘blended’ learning. But, already a year earlier, at the opening of the Learntec Forum in Karlsruhe on February 4, 2003, Commissioner Reding promoted blended learning as the future for e-learning:

“Modern e-learning solutions now recognise the importance of learning as a social process and offer possibilities for collaboration with other learners, for interaction with the learning content and for guidance from teachers, trainers and tutors. (…) Teachers and trainers once more play a central role, using virtual and traditional face-to-face interaction with their students in a “blended” approach. An approach in which they are no longer seen simply as consumers of pre-determined e-learning content, but as editors, authors and contributors to a contextualised learning scenario”.

This statement by Mrs Reding is not to be read as a total decline of e-leaning or online education, but as recognition of the need for teacher-student interaction and shared responsibility in the learning process. Neither should the statement be taken as an indication of lost confidence in ICT as the means by which to realise the vision for the Knowledge Society by the Commission.

Taken together, the OECD reports, the VET-report and Mrs Reding’s statement indicate that the success of e-learning depends on pedagogical development and the closer integration of technology within students’ previous learning experiences.

Attempts to dig deeper into the problems of eLearning

Parallel to the experiments with virtual universities over the last decade, many universities, particularly open universities, have implemented e-learning solutions in their programmes, often with a touch of the blended approach. Let me use the Open University of the UK as an example.

The success of the UKOU has often been seen as a direct consequence of its well-prepared educational resources and the conscious use of educational technology in a speed adapted to students’ needs. The point I want to make is that this interpretation overlooks an essential feature in the UKOU concept: the integration of learning activities in the resources and the tutorials – and the ability to make these activities culturally relevant. The success of the UKOU is related to the implementation of a social constructivist approach to learning. They shifted the concept of learning from knowledge acquisition to knowledge construction.

The difficulties faced by many of the e-learning and online learning initiatives mentioned above have been caused by viewing learning, and especially e-learning, as a process of knowledge transfer instead of knowledge construction - too much emphasis has been placed on the concept of stand-alone courses and resource-based learning. This approach has been supported, on the one hand by a relative success of short, practice-orientated just-in-time and just-in-place courses available on the Internet or on CD-ROM and, on the other hand, by a focus on learning objects – reusable learning resources - as a possible means of reducing costs in education.

My point is not to diminish the achievements of the learning object concept, but to question the concept of learning, which in many cases is incorporated through instructional design theory. “Instructional design is based on the empiric assumption that behaviour is predictable, and that educational design, therefore, can occur in isolation from educational execution.” (Koper, 2000 p.14), but: “(…) a lot of learning does not come from knowledge resources at all, but stems from the activities of learners solving problems, interacting with real devices, interacting in their social and work situation. (…) it is the activities of the learners in the learning environment which are accountable for the learning.” (Koper, 2001 p.3).

Learning resources (learning objects) broadly taken only become active during the learning process when the learner is doing something useful with them. The creation of relevant learning activities becomes essential. Successful learning activities mobilise the capacities (present knowledge, cultural heritage, etc.) of learners and establish a dialogue with the new learning resource as the basis for learning. Hereby, teachers and tutors are reinstalled in a position as responsible for organising the learning process. They are choosing relevant learning resources and creating learning activities needed in order to reach defined educational objectives.

Technologies to enhance learning as e-learning should augment these realities of the learning process – interaction, communication, collaboration and construction; in order to be successful and meet expectations, the knowledge society has to offer ICT-based learning in the future.