Is support really necessary within educational games?

Henny Leemkuil (1) , Robert de Hoog (1)

1 Department of Instructional Technology

Games can be powerful learning devices because of their interactive and multimedia capabilities, and their abilities to keep students motivated, active, deeply immersed and engaged for sustained periods of time. Yet the extent to which this translates into more effective knowledge and skill acquisition is not clear from the research reported so far. Several researchers have stressed that support tools should be added to game environments to ensure that learning takes place. In this paper we will elaborate on this issue and will report data from experiments with a simulation game called KM Quest. In these experiments the effectiveness of several (learning) support tools was investigated. The data give indications that particular types of support (like advice) limit learning while others (feedback, just-intime information) might enhance learning. Based on these data at the end of this paper it will be discussed whether (intelligent) support within educational games is necessary.

Domains: Technology for Human Learning

Henny Leemkuil, Robert de Hoog. Is support really necessary within educational games?. Workshop on Educational Games as Intelligent Learning Environments at the 12th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education (AIED 2005), 2005, Amsterdam, Netherlands. 10 p. ⟨hal-00190099⟩