April 27, 2021 Phyllis Hillwig Current Events

What Video Games Can Teach Us About Engagement in Education

If there was one industry outside of healthcare that thrived during the pandemic, it is the video game industry. Wall Street reports record growth in sales from the large video game players such as Nintendo, Microsoft, and Twitch with record sales over 60 billion dollars.

It should be no surprise then that 91% of children between the ages of 2-17 play video games and that video game addiction is on the rise with boys more addicted compared to girls (12% vs 6%, respectively). This is not just a US phenomenon, but a world-wide one. In 2019, The World Health Organization voted to add “gaming disorder” to the international classification of disease and South Korea declared gaming disorder a public health crisis, concerned that more than 600,000 children struggle with normal functions as a result of gaming addiction.

What makes video games so addicting and so powerful? Why are some kids who are diagnosed with learning disabilities and can’t focus in an academic situation, so focused and skilled at video game play? What is the secret sauce to video games and keeping kids engaged?

Video game development teams hire psychologists and neuroscience experts with the goal of keeping you playing without knowing that is what is happening. This is not new. Social media apps also use psychology to motivate and keep you coming back for more. Can educators learn from these psychological measures to help keep kids engaged in learning?

Simple Psychology of Video Game Play

Competition – with yourself or others to reach a goal. Measuring to peers openly to see where you rank.
Choice and Self Direction – From making your own Avatar, picking your tool, or level, kids are more likely to engage with choice.
Safe Failure – If you lose, you get to start over. You can keep training and upping your level of play as you get better on your own time.
Rewards Along the Way – short, encouraging ‘great job’ or small wins add to the bigger wins and continues to motivate..
Team and Collaboration – Learning should be social. Sharing how to defeat or get past an obstacle, working together to solve problems makes you a stronger player.

I work as a math coach in a Baltimore City school that wants to increase their math performance. One of the teachers I work with said he could not get his first graders to do homework. In our discussion he casually mentioned there was a national competition from one of the math game subscriptions he had. I said, let’s sign them up and see what happens. Most recently, he was excited to report that his kids are 5th out of 393 in the state and all of his kids are competing which he never thought would happen. Here was his dashboard. I asked, “Why do you think they are NOW motivated to do homework?” He replied, “They saw the points of their peers which motivated them to do more. They also took pride in their ranking and wanted to keep it.”- Are video game components working to support learning and education in his case?

Education companies that are focused on game design have argued that games keep kids engaged and learning, especially in tough subjects like math and science. There are thousands of educational game companies that bank on using video game psychology to keep students learning and engaged. BUT – What does research say? Well, according to research, whether video games actually help is debatable. Richard Mayer, a distinguished professor of psychology and well known for his research on multimedia learning, computer-supported learning, and computer games for learning says that “despite the growing popularity of such games, research has yet to determine whether they really help children learn.” There are video game companies that test their games to ensure they are effective with learners. A few friends of mine are founders of Legends of Learning, a company that makes video games to support math and science learning. Prior to the start of the company, they partnered with Vanderbilt University to test whether video games kept kids more engaged in learning than those who did not play. Their results are published in the Journal of Learning Sciences and show that students are indeed more engaged when they practice skills with video games. More research is needed to show the effectiveness of video games in supporting learning in education.

Some argue that education games are never really as enjoyable as a traditional video game. Playing an education-based video game is like eating ‘chocolate-covered broccoli.’ Maybe this will change as Sony and Playstation, arguably two of the largest video game companies build games to support teachers and students.

So, as parents and educators, how DO we compete with video games? The answer is we can’t and if you try, you will lose. Take it for what it is – an outlet for social activity and for simply fun. Don’t overthink it. Obviously if your child is losing sleep, getting poor grades, and not eating because of video game play, then there is a larger problem. But if they are turning to video games, for fun and especially for education, that’s not the worst thing in the world.

What we CAN do is take a few things away from video game producers that help us with the psychology of motivating our children to learn anything.

Give them choice and a say in what they do.
Give them a safe space to fail. Try again if needed and that’s all part of learning.
Encourage socialization – working in groups, teams, or pairs.
Start with a training ground and continue to build – always reaching and growing to the ‘next level’.
Promote healthy, fun competition with peers to strive for improvement
Keep it fun and light, and continue to engage them in interesting new challenges.

We use many of these techniques in our work at Eurekii. We include games with students young and old! (Note: Kids and teachers not in masks were pre-COVID)

“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.” – Benjamin Franklin

At the very least, games, including video games involve the learner. In a world where there is endless distraction, just getting the attention, focus, and involvement are a good step towards learning anything. Remember, kids don’t dread or get stressed out when they are ready to play a video game. They are excited and eager to go for that challenge. Why can’t we try to strive for that in education?