Using Non-player Characters to Scaffold Non-gamer Students in Serious Gaming

Abstract

Curiosity is the best driving force for learning; keeping learners curious by engaging them via gaming has been regarded as a desirable approach to education. Virtual Interactive Student-Oriented Learning Environment (VISOLE) is a pedagogical approach to serious gaming that we have proposed. Based on the VISOLE pedagogy, we developed Farmtasia ® , a multiplayer online serious game based on a thematic topic, Agriculture, in the Hong Kong senior secondary geography education curriculum. Drawing on the notion of virtual mentoring, we aim to further enhance the design of the game by introducing a number of non-player characters (NPCs) to scaffold non-gamer students' learning in the gameplay process. This chapter reports a learning experiment in which we compared the pedagogical effectiveness of the revised version of the game with that of the original version, in terms of non-gamer students' knowledge acquisition. The results show that the experimental group students (who learned with the revised) significantly outperformed the control group students (who learned with the original), with a considerable effect size.

Design-based research on teacher facilitation practices for serious gaming in formal schooling

“…, the “virtual mentors” (in Sweller et al’s terms, “germane resources”) to further support the students throughout the gaming process. This positive pedagogic effect did align with what we had observed in our earlier pilot study on the revised game with non-gamer learners (Jong, Shang & Tam, 2016). Moreover, to provide a “valid reason” of participation for these “achieving learners” (Biggs & Moore, 1993) whose learning motive usually pivots on “getting higher scores,” assigning the game-based learning tasks as formal assignments became an important act in the setting.…”

“…In addition, the blogging gadget in the game was revamped to support both text-based and audio-based blogging. The revised game was pilot-tested before the second enactment (Jong, Shang, Tam, 2016).…”

Knowing the Students’ Game-Playing Characteristics as a Prerequisite for Successful Gamification in Education

“…With this in mind, besides a detailed step-by-step tutorial, providing the following should be considered: a) space/simple casual games for students to practice: video-game literacy, hand-eye coordination and video-spatial skills; and b) a non-player-character with a role of a learning coach to address: technical gameplay enquiries and basic domainspecific question. In addition, involving a learning coach can facilitate the transition to a gamified learning instruction by reliving teachers' fears of not being sufficiently game-literate to respond to technical game-play inquires and promote their confidence in a gamified teaching (Jong, Shang & Tam, 2016).…”