Educational Video Games in the World of Tomorrow
Michael Jude Plesniarski
Game Design Masters of Science, Full Sail University
GDM 551: Methods and User Experience
Dr. Robert Kennedy
July 27, 2024
For decades, video games have provided countless hours of entertainment to millions of people around the world. Often cast aside and considered a toy, something to be played with by a child or young adult, but beneath the perceived shell that society has blanketed this form, video games have their place as an educational and constructive tool, and this paper is going to expose not only the why but the how.
Using video games as an educational tool is essential because they benefit physical and cognitive changes in children and adults. Authors Campos and Fernandez documented the results of extensive evaluations on how video games can be used with and contrasted by physical exercise in their 2016 writing, The Benefits of Active Video Games for Educational and Physical Activity Approaches: A Systematic Review. Active games benefits do not stop with just the physical changes; cognitive changes associated with children who have dyslexia have been documented in 2023 by Murray and Birch, authors of Thinking Outside the Phonological Box: Combining Repeated Reading and Action Video Games to Develop Reading Fluency in Year 7 Children with Dyslexia.
Current Research
Current research on using video games as a direct tool to teach and encourage motivation in children and adults has been documented for almost half a century. Video games have been used to teach and improve motor skills while aiding the test subject’s overall physical capabilities by assisting in weight reduction (Campos & Fernandez, 2016).
In their review of testing done using active video games, that is, those that require physical motor skill usage to play, test subjects showed remarkable gains in both their ability to do physical tasks and the frequency of time at which they could partake in those activities when compared to the scores of the control group, which was limited to only traditional exercise techniques, the experimental group excelled by a large majority (Campos & Fernandez, 2016). It is also worth noting that the attitudes towards physical activity changed for the better amongst the experimental group members when compared to both their initial assessment and that of the control group. This increase in motivation could be related to the increased scoring and desire to continue among the experimental group.
Active video games have not only contributed to changes associated with exercise and physical activity but games of this genre have also been used to understand better how playing them can help children with dyslexia. Dyslexia is a neurological impairment that affects a person’s reading ability (Murray & Birch, 2023).
The research they were interested in concerned visual attention, which can be explained as a person’s ability to remain focused on currently active stimuli and maintain that focus without distraction. Their research exposed a similar hypothesis and experiment in which children with dyslexia were instructed to play active video games daily instead of traditional reading assignments. Without opening a physical book, these students increased their reading ability outside the video game environment (Franceschini et al., 2013, as cited by Murray & Birch, 2013). Upon further evaluation, adding active video games and traditional reading curricula also proved to show favorable results for video game applications as a tool for education.
Focusing on a broader body of educational curriculums, Meghan Arias published an article in 2014 titled Using Video Games in Education. Her research appears to cover many classroom subjects and the games that were applied as educational tools. Overall, research showed that test subjects who played games increased their math, history, and science abilities and social and language skills.
The data processed by Arias (2014) highlighted several games used in different classrooms, which helped students better understand the subject material. As an outcome, motivation and attitudes toward learning were also documented. Students were more interested in learning and developing their theories than in playing for enjoyment.
In 2012, a university professor began using video games in his college-level courses (Wainwright, 2014). His work on “Teaching Historical Theory Through Video Games” exposes some of the practical ways he decided to incorporate the game Sid Meier’s Civilizations IV (Meier, 2005) into his curriculum.
During this time, gameplay was a requirement and operated in conjunction with traditional learning methods. Students would use the content they learned in class and compare it to how history is depicted through the lens of a video game. Understanding why changes were made in reflection of cultural acceptance while also discussing the theoretical aspects of what could have occurred throughout the history of a specific period in time. In this regard, the gameplay was used to express what is already known and as a tool to convey a sense of practicality to what would be exclusively theoretical (Wainwright, 2014).
Using video games and instructive tools is critical to applying video games to an educational program. This interested Leuchter and Kurtz when they wrote their paper Effects of Instructions, Assistance, Narrative, Competition, Challenge and Age on Performance in Digital Learning Games (Leuchter & Kurtz, 2022). Studies showed that students who had some assistance on tasks and operated in a multiplayer environment excelled compared to those who were isolated and playing alone.
In the book Exploding the Castle: Rethinking How Video Games and Video Game Mechanics Can Shape the Future of Education (Bell & Gresalfi, 2017, as edited by Young & Slota, 2017), much focus is on concerns about how teachers would implement video games into the curriculum if they did not already do so and sheds some light on current issues with implementation.
What was exposed were different ways that video games could be used to teach subjects such as math and history and how this could be used to help improve memory functions. Much focus was spent on creating theoretical concepts that could later be built out and used to create programs with a deeper connection and understanding of how video games can be tools of education as well as what role educators should have; this also included how much information show be presented to ensure positive results (Bell & Gresalfi, 2017, as edited by Young & Slota, 2017).
All of what has already been discussed and sought after already exists. The systems required were already put in place, at least from a theoretical perspective, through the guise of a movie used to entertain in Ready Player One (Spielberg, 2018).
In this movie adaptation of the book Ready Player One (Cline, 2011), the world, though it exists outside of the digital realm, is rooted in its connection to a metaverse known as the Oasis. During this time, the user can experience real-time feedback on their actions while being connected to everything in the known universe. This includes social, economic, and, most importantly, education. An individual led instructions to thousands of people, and progress was observed in real-time. The experiences shared between the users and the system in this movie highlight many of the previously discussed sources have voiced concerns regarding, while not addressing others, such as financial or other external validity and construct validity issues.
New Model
A significant amount of data has been collected and processed throughout the years. Many of the questions that have been asked now have their answers, and it is time to build further on the knowledge we have gained. Large-scale infrastructure to house the digital capabilities of both physical and cognitive skills would be required to create a universally applicable system. This system would need constant updating as the stream of knowledge continues to grow. Unlike what is depicted in the movie Ready Player One (Spielberg, 2018), this knowledge would have to be rooted in reality and not fantasy.
It has already been established that students excel more in a multiplayer environment than in a single-player when working with educational material (Leuchter & Kurtz). One crucial element missing from the traditional education platform was the ability of enough teachers to provide appropriate feedback to students.
Developing a digital metaverse based on the premises of reality will enable those who experience it to socialize and learn with a greater depth of available resources. This would enable students worldwide to receive an education and allow educators to universalize educational curriculum. Developing such a platform will require decades of dedication to ensure that the educational material is available and presented in a way that it allows students to absorb and educators to build supporting educational platforms based on all of the real-world data that has been integrated into the system.
As real-world data is brought to the digital platform, developers and educators can collaborate on creating educational media that students will then access through the metaverse. As the flow of data continues and enough information becomes available, standardizing the educational approaches used to deliver the material and a universally accepted notion of what that content should include will enable students to have equal access to knowledge and universally understood knowledge.
Similar to the development life cycle of creating video games for entertainment, these games and educational applications must go through many stages of iterative design. During the iterative design process, it will become critical to have the games and applications tested through many series of playtesting as well as scientific research to ensure not only the product itself is of excellent quality but also the content provided to teach, which would be at its core academically sound and scientifically accurate. This also includes ensuring history remains historically accurate.
Experimentation will also be needed to ensure that the material learned in the digital world transcends the student’s real-world expectations and applies to real-world scenarios. These experiments should test students who are only receiving their education through the digital platform compared to those who are receiving an education in the traditional format. Based on the results, researchers, educators, and developers can work together to enhance the program and create additional programs based on what they have determined to be successful.
Since all knowledge known in the real-world is being added to the system, this system would enable people of all ages to learn quite literally anything that has already been known about the real world while also enabling theoretical research and frameworks into what could have been different or how change might affect a population before it ever has to happen outside of the digital box.
Limitations
There will be many limitations to this work and building upon its foundations. However, it is worth noting that some of these initial limitations can be mitigated, while certain others will automatically be mitigated through the increased scope of data from the real world entering the digital platform. Limitations arise from external validity because it is possible that this would be neither the correct time nor the initial studies could involve the wrong people. This could be because the technology is just not available at this time to begin the project. It could also be that the people selected for testing the systems are not the ones that the researchers and developers need for testing.
Another limitation that is also a threat to construct validity is the interaction of different treatments. Since test subjects who are connected to the digital world would have access to a wealth of knowledge, it would become difficult for researchers to determine which aspects of the program are the most beneficial to the growth of the educational platform. For example, if several games and programs are used to teach math, they will need to test each program to establish more information.
Future Research
Additional research will have to be generated to better understand the appropriate levels of feedback that students require to not only build the foundations of knowledge but do so comfortably, enabling them to have greater motivation for the material and enhance their overall educational experience.
Research should also remain a constant functionality of developing this system and should continue long after this system is already in place. This will ensure the accuracy of the content while also keeping the content fresh for the students.
Based on future research outcomes, developers can add more to the overall platform, expanding it to include aspects of play that are rooted in pure enjoyment, and over time, the system, much like its users, will evolve.
Conclusion
Everything discussed presently indicates that video games do, in fact, have a place as a tool within the educational system. Researchers and authors have already discussed how games could be used to both teach and motivate students, encouraging their success (Franceschini et al., 2013, as cited by Murray & Birch, 2013).
Also discussed was an artificial world created by man, which held knowledge of the universe, at least as he perceived it to be. From this visual understanding and theoretical concept, the round work can begin to create a metaverse that meets the criteria we perceive as required for education and the constructs of learning.
The mentors who have agreed to help express this research more clearly are Dr. Robert Kennedy and a university library assistant director, Marie. Combined, they have a wealth of scholarly and applied knowledge that will aid in ensuring that content remains accurate as well as either theoretically or scientifically sound.
This does not only connect to one capstone; this research and framework will require the combined knowledge of every capstone. Indie and Triple A are both aspects of a company’s financials, so they are automatic. Serious games are generally where applications that have benefits outside of the digital world are produced, it would be some concepts from here that will need to be applied for the scholarly and educational aspects of the New Model. User Experience and Human Factors, these two tracks share a lot of similarities in how they tackle testing and quality assurance. Knowledge from here will be needed to ensure the new model is accessible to everyone and that the experience, knowledge, and expectations are met. Extended reality is exactly what would be created; this system is an extension of the reality humans currently perceive. This track knowledge will be critical to ensuring accuracy when transferring the world visually from the real world into the digital. Essential knowledge here would be understanding the software and hardware requirements for both the developers and the end-user experience.
Last and probably most importantly, we have the Thesis track. What makes this the most essential track is that before any work involving many of the other tracks, this one must begin, and one already has it by reading this paper. This track will be where knowledge in preparing proper scientific and theoretical documentation will be learned, and the accuracy and quality of future work will be explored.
Going back to statements made about Indie and Triple-A, their relevance to this work is in marketing and distribution. Together, these two platforms target the majority of gamers and will provide useful knowledge in generating revenue to continue producing this New Model.
References
Arias, M. (2014). Using Video Games in Education. Journal of Mason Graduate Research, 49-69.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.13021/G8jmgr.v1i2.416
Cline, E. (2011). Ready Player One. Crown Publishing Group.
ISBN 10: 030788743X ISBN 13: 9780307887436
Franceschini, S., Gori, S., Ruffino, M., et al. (2013) Action video games makes dyslexic children read better. Current Biology, 23(6) 462-466
Leuchter, I., & Kurtz, G. (2022). Effects of Instructions, Assistance, Narrative, Competition, Challenge, and Age on Performances in Digital Learning Games. International Journal of Advanced Corporate Learning, 16-33.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3991/ijac.v15i2.30867
Marino-Capos, C., & del Castillo, H. (2016). The Benefits of Active Video Games for Educational and Physical Activity Approaches: A Systematic Review. New Approaches in Educational Research, 115-122.
DOI https://doi.org/10.7821/naer.2016.7.164
Murray, J., & Birch, S. (2023). Thinking outside the phonological box: Video games to develop reading fluency in year 7 children with dyslexia. Education & Child Psychology 40(1), 78-95.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.53841/bpsecp.2023.40.1.78
Spielberg, S. (Director). (2018). Ready Player One [Motion Picture].
Wainwright, M. A. (2014). Teaching Historical Theory through Video Games. The History Teacher 47(4), 579-612. https://societyforhistoryeducation.org/pdfs/A14_Wainwright.pdf
Young, M. F., Bell, A., & Gresalfi, M. (2017). Exploding Castle Rethinking How Video Games & Game Mechanics Can Shape The Future Of Education. Charlotte: Information Age Publishing Inc.
ISBN: 1681239353