Gamification Case Study: Release Your Angry Bird June 28, 2014

Our June 19^th session was hosted by Zsolt Olah, a Senior Program Manager at Comcast University’s Product Knowledge team. About five years ago, when Comcast University started using more and more “challenges” and “immersive learning activities” in blended and e-learning solutions, gamification was not as loud and widespread as it is today.

In our session, Zsolt reviewed some of the background and recent realities of gamification. He then provided examples of gamified learning activities explaining that game-based thinking was just as important to the overall design and instructional value of a course. The attached PowerPoint also contains a few slides letting you know that Zsolt gave us a case-in-point gamified session as well (i.e. pigs showing team scores).

ATD_PHL_June2014_zsolt_gamification 2

Here are a few key points that Zsolt mentioned that accompany the slide presentation.

Some entertaining examples of gamification: Amazing Race (gamified running), Top Chef (gamified cooking). However, not everything should be gamified or people will become tired of it. With our training courses, gamification is scalable. You can apply a few or many elements – as long as the learning experience is improved to some degree.

There are two types of gamification: knowledge checks (check your memory) or content converted in a more memorable and immersive manner intended to teach you new things. It is proven that learning content through some kind of experience is more memorable. Games that provide challenges or goals and opportunities to learn something (even solely for entertainment) can invoke people to become so driven that collectively many, many hours are consumed playing (16 years spent every one hour).

Various levels of authoring software are available depending on your level of technical savvy:

> Off-the-shelf: Raptivity and eLearning Brothers have templates (rapid development, but structured, not much flexibility)

> Intermediate: Wavicle and Axonify have more flexibility, but require more development time.

> Higher-end: Construct 2 game engine has user physics built in (user actions trigger an onscreen effect). Much more development time; programmer background is useful, but not required.

Many graphics are free, but you must be sure to cite the sources somewhere! Graphic treatments (layout, imagery) can also be used to disguise typical eLearning interactions to seem more game-based, i.e. non-conventional placement of drag-and-drop objects on an image background.

Our Challenge: Convert content-based instructional design to game-based instructional design. Creating the framework first is the key. Write the story behind the game using reality elements and then turn them into a game.