Towards an Engaging and Gamified Online Learning Environment—A Real CaseStudy

Abstract

Currently, remote work is common, and this trend has come to several areas and processes, such as education and teaching. Regarding higher education, universities have several challenges to overcome, the most challenging being transforming teaching to be more digital and engaging. Therefore, TechTeach has arisen as a new teaching paradigm that creates a unique learning environment and satisfies students’ and professors’ expectations. After the success of the b-learning approach, professors created new experiences utilizing an entirely online learning environment following this paradigm. This article shows the work performed through a real case study, explains the strategy used to implement this paradigm, provides students’ opinions, and analyses the results achieved. The results demonstrated that, while the effort was tremendous, the result was beneficial to all. After 208 online hours of classes, 11,173 downloads, 15,224 messages, 200,000 sessions, 3 rescues requests, and 28t cards, 98.15% of the active participants gave it their approval, 96.53% considered this subject equal to or better than the others, and 85% of accepted the gamification system. These results show that a class can be an engaging environment where students can learn and enjoy it regardless of whether it is physical or not.

The Effects of Gamification in Education: A Systematic Literature Review

“…In education, student engagement, motivation, creativity, and academic performance are very important, and many researchers use many new technologies and strategies to affect all these positively in which gamification is one of them. Several studies (Topirceanu, 2017;Bernik et al, 2019;Hasan et al, 2019;Portela et al, 2022) highlighted that gamification improves student involvement in learning activities by utilizing a variety of teaching techniques, including tests, escape rooms, and serious games integrated gamification. Furthermore, gamification education platforms help students in terms of motivation to participate in the learning process.…”

“…Moreover, Tavares (2022) stated that studies utilizing a variety of teaching techniques, including quizzes, escape rooms, and serious games, were generally well-liked by students, who supported their extensive use within their curriculum. Finally, Portela (2022) demonstrated that a classroom can be a stimulating setting where students can learn and have fun whether or not it is physically active, and that gamification can be used to encourage student activities, boost engagement, and evaluate their success.…”

“…Motivation: Portela (2022) expressed that creating an interesting environment and inspiring students are the two biggest challenges in teaching. E-learning technologies for future teachers are on scientists' minds, as pedagogy requires a specialist to constantly adjust to rapidly changing conditions, process new information, introduce pedagogical innovations, etc.…”

“…Some of the studies made use of Moodle (Aguilos & Fuchs, 2022;Bernik et.al, 2020;Bernik et.al., 2017;Szegedine Lengyel, 2020), other gamification tools or platforms highlighted in the literature are Coursera, EDX. TechTeach can adjust to various situations, it seeks to improve student participation and use gamification to create a more engaging, enjoyable, and digital learning environment (Portela, 2022). EUR gamified mobile application is a learning tool that students can use to assess their own comprehension and track their academic progress (Zafar et al, 2018).…”