Beyond Badges: Understanding Game Dynamics in the Social Age

Many applications of gaming in learning simply encourage competitive or game behaviors—they lack a focus on true learning or underlying game dynamics. Instead, much use of gaming in learning focuses on technology or badges. But it’s game dynamics that power the game experience, which can include aspects of generosity, collaboration, sharing, trading, perspective, and power.

Participants in this session will explore 10 different game dynamics and learn how to relate these dynamics to social-learning approaches, mobile-learning approaches, or traditional training. Ideally all three! Moving beyond competition and badges, you’ll examine how you can use gaming approaches to build coherence and trust in communities, as well as using micro-rewards and input approaches to drive learner engagement over time. The aim of this session is to encourage you to think of more holistic and inclusive approaches to learning games that truly enhance competence, not just reward the gamers.

In this session, you will learn:

• How games truly work
• To recognize the risk of leaving people behind
• About 10 underlying dynamics of games in learning
• How to apply these dynamics
• About the roles of kindness, fairness, and trust in game application

Audience:
Intermediate designers, developers, and CLOs interested in learning design, not just games.

Handout(s)

Recording

September 10, 2015