Designing Digitally
10/26/2018
The game-based learning market is on the rise and is expected to reach 7.3 billion by 2021. A research by the UC-Denver Business School concluded that participants who learned through playing games ended up with 14% higher skill-based knowledge, 11% higher factual knowledge, and 9% higher retention rate than those who learned via other methods.
Now, you cannot ignore those figures, can you? The earlier you recognize its importance and join the action, the better for you.
In this technique of teaching, the game is the basic foundation and training content is weaved into the game structure. In a learning game, you let the learners play a segment of the game and then present them with learning material. The game keeps the learners engaged and helps them take in more learning content and enhance knowledge retention.
The basic idea behind game-based learning is teaching learners through repetition and failure. Most video games are built with this technique. The player starts slow and steady. Gradually, they must hone their skills to navigate through difficult levels with ease. The challenge is to keep the level of difficulty just right. Make it too difficult and the players lose interest. Make it easy and the players sail through it without any effort.
Game-based learning emulates the same concept. Learners work to achieve a goal. They choose their actions and face its consequences. If they make mistakes, they get to learn from it. This way of learning is interactive and not passive. Studies show that learners retain more knowledge from game-based learning than with a passive learning mode. Take flight simulators for example. The pilots chase specific goals and practice until they achieve them. The learning is way more productive than attending lectures and reading up content.
Interested in learning more about what game-based learning is, reasons it works, tips for implementation, and how to overcome common challenges? Download our Game-Based Learning is a Game Changer in Corporate Training white paper now!