Abstract-The future of educational technology has been envisioned to have increasing focus on simulations, game based learning, virtual learning environments and virtual worlds. The technologies aim to provide authentic learning and enable deeper, more complex and contextual understanding for students. To study the impact of virtual learning environments for natural sciences and engineering education, we have designed and implemented a virtual laboratory, LabLife3D, in Second Life. To date we have designed six virtual laboratory exercises in the biological sciences and chemistry and additionally created a system to gather behavioristic data during laboratory simulations for the purpose of learning analytics. This paper presents the design process of laboratory exercises and discusses the contentspecific learning goals and outcomes. Additionally, this paper discusses the use of heuristic usability review used to improve the virtual learning environment. Lastly, the results from student and teacher interviews are presented, together with results of the learning analytics study. The discussion also includes student identified affordances and barriers for learning. We conclude that authentic and deep learning is possible within virtual worlds. Furthermore, the results of this study are not only limited to virtual worlds, but could also apply to other areas of digital educational technology.

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This paper presents a comprehensive summary of the Gamified Solutions in Healthcare (GSH) research project, which is a joint research project between Turku University of Applied Sciences and the University of Turku. The goal of the project is to promote exercise, social inclusiveness and enhance quality of life, aiming at developing new services and effective activity solutions for the elderly through gamification. During the research project elderly people were included in the development and testing of games so that they could be used for more than just entertainment purposes. According to all of our tests elderly enjoy playing exergames, and digital games can be an effective way to enhance the quality of life of the elderly. In the case studies it was observed that the players where motivated while playing but motivation should also be maintained throughout the gameplay. The elderly gave overall positive feedback for the idea of using digital activity games for exercising.

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