Can Digital Natives Level-Up in a Gamified Curriculum?

Abstract

The compulsion to include games and game related mechanism in education is great among educators who want to engage and motivate today?s students and the latest buzzword in this domain is gamification. However, without a thorough understanding of what a gamified curriculum looks like, how it can best be applied and why it might engross students, it cannot be effectively applied. This research examined a gamified course curriculum structure and evaluated its use in two university level subjects. The objective was to gauge student enjoyment and engagement with a heavily gamified curriculum and to understand the aspects that make the practice useful in education. Exploratory factor analysis of the dataset revealed the possibility of a six dimensional model of curriculum gamification worthy of future study.