Given the crucial role of writing in both academic and workplace settings, teachers should constantly seek effective ways to improve their students' writing skills. The use of games or their elements to support the teaching and learning of writing has gained much attention in language education studies. Despite the increasing number of empirical…

While serious role-play games have been developed for individuals with autism spectrum disorders to learn social interactions and emotions, there is a lack of role-playing games that teach people without autism the necessary communication skills to engage and interact effectively with autistic people. In this research, we present a mobile serious…

Hadoop is a well-known big data system and a subject covered in many big data courses. This article describes two role play games for teaching the two fundamental components in the Hadoop framework, MapReduce and Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS). In the games, students form teams and play different roles as a part of a Hadoop cluster. The…

This paper explores the contribution to geography teaching which can be made by serious games. We describe the ways in which gaming has progressed from "dissected maps" and jigsaws through board games, to the range of online games which are available today. We describe the development, in conjunction with European partner institutions,…

Today, there is growing interest in digital game-based learning (DGBL) due to the increase in the variety of educational and commercial games available. Literature indicates that video games in general have entertaining, motivational, and educational benefits. Despite this, there is a lack of research comparing game types to assess their value for…

We present a systematic review of the literature on the use of multiuser virtual environments (MUVE) on the development of pragmatic competence in second language (L2) learners. Specifically, we reviewed studies examining the potential of L2 pragmatic development through synthetic immersive virtual environment (SIE) and massively multiplayer…

Finding proper ways to address learning about sustainability is a relevant issue. Sustainability learning has to face some inherent complexities, due to two main factors: the interdisciplinary domains related to sustainability issues, such as ecology, economics, politics, and culture, and the involvement of several social structures, such as…

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often find it difficult to communicate using body language and facial expressions to respond appropriately socially. This negatively affects the quality of their everyday social life. Children with ASD can learn to socially interact with virtual three-dimensional (3D) characters in animated games…

This paper draws on an empirical work dedicated to discussing a theoretical model for design-based research. The context of our study is a research project for the design, the implementation and the analysis of Insectophagia, a digital role-play game implemented in secondary schools. The model presented in this paper aims at conceptualizing…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to use Fink's (2013) taxonomy of significant learning in a retail marketing class to help rural, price-sensitive students develop empathy toward high-end urban customers while becoming self-directed learners. Design/methodology/approach: Using a 16-week pilot course, students developed a gaming prototype and…

This article presents a pedagogical approach to training seminarians for faith leadership in the era of what Heidi Campbell has called "networked religion." It argues that the increasing digital mediation of religious practice, expression, and community represents an opportunity for students to explore and inhabit ministry sites and…

Given the importance of word knowledge for second language acquisition, there is always a need for effective word-learning approaches from language learners. With the rapid development of educational technologies, game-based learning is emerging into a field with considerable potential, within which, digital game-based vocabulary learning has…

In this article, we offer an account of a two-day workshop conducted with a group of postgraduate English and Drama student teachers, part of a larger AHRC-funded research project. Our focus is on reading and the reception of a canonical text, in this case Beowulf. We argue that taking a transmedia approach helps learners to think about the…

Among recent e-Learning Pedagogical Strategies, gaming and crisis-simulation games are increasingly used in recent years in university-learning and Blended-courses as an out-of-context effective tool for role-playing and education, especially in Law Schools and Business Schools. Gaming covers several sub-fields (war-games; Law School Mock-Trials;…

This article presents a role-play game for software project management (SPM) in a three-dimensional online multiuser virtual world. The Opensimulator platform is used for the creation of an immersive virtual environment that facilitates students' collaboration and realistic interaction, in order to manage unexpected events occurring during the…