The Educational Potential of Modified Video Games

Abstract

As the popularity of video game playing has increased, educators have sought to co-opt video games as an instructional tool. However, educational games have made little impact in either the commercial market place or the average game player's home library. The modification, or modding, of video games using in-game editors may be used by instructors to introduce educational content to professionally designed video games. This paper examines the effectiveness of a modified video game, Civilization IV, in improving the comprehension and retention of historical knowledge of 10 th , 11 th , and 12 th grade students. Students exposed to the modified video game significantly improved their immediate recall of knowledge level history items. Students expressed interest in future educational game playing and felt that they had a better understanding of application level history items. While these results are encouraging, the small sample size of this experiment prevents generalization and necessitates further study.

Serious Games Analytics: Theoretical Framework

“…Interestingly, Clark's observations about MCS are technology independent and can be applied to almost any kind of technology used in learning and instruction. Examples of media comparison design involving game-based learning can be seen in the study by Moshirnia ( 2007 ) and the study with the Maritime Warfare School (Caspian Learning, 2010 ). As mentioned previously, this research method is fl awed and should be avoided at all costs in serious games research.…”

The Gameplay Enjoyment Model

“…In a series of three studies, undergraduate business, economics, and management students who played educational games as a part of their respective courses showed statistically significantly higher test scores than students who did not play the games (Blunt, 2007). Likewise, pre-post academic performance increases have been demonstrated in K-12 social studies using an off-the-shelf commercial game (Foster, 2011) and in undergraduate history education using a modified commercial game (Moshirnia & Israel, 2010). Similarly, the use of games has lead to pre-post learning gains in K-12 math education (Cordova & Lepper, 1996;Ke & Grabowski, 2007;Parker & Lepper, 1992).…”

Modding and Rezzing in Games and Virtual Environments for Education

“…Besides research and development work made possible through game modification using GDKs, education researchers have also investigated the game modification process from the perspectives of contemporary learning theories. For example, using an instructivist's approach, Moshirnia (2007) conducted a study investigating the effectiveness of a modified game in helping 10th-12th graders comprehend and retain declarative knowledge of history. Findings were generally positive and showed the students to be able to retain and comprehend the learning materials.…”