For Educators: 6 Books on Gamification in Education

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For Educators: 6 Books on Gamification in Education
(Last Updated On: January 12, 2018)

For educators: 6 books on gamification in educationWhy do we have to make life and learning such a chore? Effectively applying gaming elements to learning can help make it more fun and lead to better results. Gamification is the application of gaming elements to an otherwise mundane task. This collection of books can help you get on the right path.

The Multiplayer Classroom: Designing Coursework as a Game, 1st Edition
by Lee Sheldon

Publisher description:
Discover how to engage your students and raise their grades and attendance in your classroom. THE MULTIPLAYER CLASSROOM: DESIGNING COURSEWORK AS A GAME is your detailed guide to designing any structured learning experience as a game. Written for professional educators or those learning to be educators, here are the tools to engage and excite students by using principles learned in the development of popular video games. Suitable for use in the classroom or the boardroom, the book features a reader-friendly style that introduces game concepts and vocabulary in a logical way. You don’t need any experience making games or even playing games to use this book. Yet, you will learn how to create multiplayer games for any age on any subject. Bring your classroom into the 21st century! My Review

Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World, Reprint Edition
by Jane McGonigal

Publisher description:
A visionary game designer reveals how we can harness the power of games to boost global happiness.
With 174 million gamers in the United States alone, we now live in a world where every generation will be a gamer generation. But why, Jane McGonigal asks, should games be used for escapist entertainment alone? In this groundbreaking book, she shows how we can leverage the power of games to fix what is wrong with the real world-from social problems like depression and obesity to global issues like poverty and climate change-and introduces us to cutting-edge games that are already changing the business, education, and nonprofit worlds. Written for gamers and non-gamers alike, Reality Is Broken shows that the future will belong to those who can understand, design, and play games.

Actionable Gamification – Beyond Points, Badges, and Leaderboards
by Yu-kai Chou

Publisher description:
The new era of Gamification and Human-Focused Design optimizes for motivation and engagement over traditional Function-Focused Design. Within the industry, studies on game mechanics and behavioral psychology have become proliferate. However, few people understand how to merge the two fields into experience designs that reliably increases business metrics and generates a return on investment. Gamification Pioneer Yu-kai Chou takes reader on a journey to learn his twelve years of obsessive research in creating the Octalysis Framework, and how to apply the framework to create engaging and successful experiences in their product, workplace, marketing, and personal lives.

The Gamification of Learning and Instruction: Game-based Methods and Strategies for Training and Education, 1st Edition
by Karl M. Kapp

Publisher description:
Games create engagement—the cornerstone of any positive learning experience. With the growing popularity of digital games and game-based interfaces, it is essential that gamification be part of every learning professional’s tool box. In this comprehensive resource, international learning expert Karl M. Kapp reveals the value of game-based mechanics to create meaningful learning experiences. Drawing together the most current information and relevant research in one resource, The Gamification of Learning and Instruction shows how to create and design games that are effective and meaningful for learners. Read more

Gamify Your Classroom: A Field Guide to Game-Based Learning (New Literacies and Digital Epistemologies), 1st New Edition
by Matthew Farber

Publisher description:
This book is a field guide on how to implement game-based learning and «gamification» techniques to the everyday teaching. It is a survey of best practices aggregated from interviews with experts in the field, including: James Paul Gee (Author, What Video Games Have to Teach Us about Learning and Literacy); Henry Jenkins (Provost Professor at University of Southern California); Katie Salen (Founder, Institute of Play); Bernie DeKoven (Author, A Playful Path); Richard Bartle (Bartle’s Player Type Theory); Kurt Squire (Games + Learning + Society Center); Jessica Millstone (Joan Ganz Cooney Center), Dan White (Filament Games); Erin Hoffman (GlassLab Games); Jesse Schell (Schell Games/Professor at Carnegie Mellon); Tracy Fullerton (University of Southern California Game Innovation Lab); Alan Gershenfeld (E-Line Media); Noah Falstein (Chief Game Designer, Google); Valerie Shute (Professor at Florida State University); Lee Sheldon (Author, The Multiplayer Classroom); Robert J. Torres (Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation), Asi Burak (President, Games for Change); Toby Rowland (MangaHigh); Jocelyn Leavitt (Hopscotch); Krishna Vedati (Tynker); and researchers at BrainPOP and designers from Electric Funstuff (Mission U.S. games). Each chapter concludes with practical lesson plan ideas, games to play (both digital and tabletop), and links to research further. Much of the book draws on the author’s experiences implementing games with his middle school students. Regardless of your teaching discipline or grade level, whether you are a pre-service teacher or veteran educator, this book will engage and reinvigorate the way you teach and how your students learn!

Explore Like a Pirate: Gamification and Game-Inspired Course Design to Engage, Enrich and Elevate Your Learners 
by Michael Matera

Publisher description:
Are you ready to transform your classroom into an experiential work that flourishes on collaboration and creativity? Then set sail with classroom game designer and educator Michael Matera as he reveals the possibilities and power of game-based learning.

In Explore Like a PIRATE, Matera serves as your experienced guide to help you apply the most motivational techniques of gameplay to your classroom using strategies that work with and enhance (rather than replace) your current curriculum. Read more

What is your favorite book on gamification in education?


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