When observing the students playing the ARG a few conclusions could be made of the way students obstruct.
1) active withdrawal: total physical absence
2) passive withdrawal: being physically present but mentally absent/ distracted
3) passive aggression: going along with the assignment but sabotaging the outcome
4) active aggression: negative talk/ mood setting/ body language, creating unease etc.
These are the hard obstructions. There are also the soft obstruction.
1) doing the assignment but making sure the outcome is ‘my own thing’.
2) doing the assignment but not investing once self in it calling it ‘not my thing’.
3) doing the assignment with a lot of resistance such as multiple ‘why oh why”
4) doing the assignment but sloppy, without careful reading or effort to stretch
Alternate Reality Game.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternate_reality_game
Thank you. Lack of motivation due to e.g. perceived injustice such as teachers favoring some pupils or the like can hamper the cooperation. It seems to me that before playing, a basic instruction why it is good to cooperate, what the gain is , what skills are promoted or other benefits (such as "golden stars* glued on a paper) from the play could help the child or young persons to really understand.They can also paint their favorite or their least favorite parts of the game. When I was drawing all stages of the path towards lung cancer as a young student I all of a sudden realized the danger of smoking.
Hello. These obstructors you mention are very interesting. What is the source?
In response to your question: In order to develop a strategy to overcome the obstructors you will need to know more about the reason why they react like that. For instance, it could simply be that they don't like that particular game they are playing. There are different gamer profiles and some tests to identify the profile of each student. They might have a different reaction if they try a different game. It could also be that students dont see 'the game' as a game, They may perceive it as an activity. That is why some scholars decide to include game play experience tests for participants to evaluate the game and ndicate if for them it was actually a game and not an activity for learning something. Here some examples:
Pavlas, D., Jentsch, F., Salas, E., Fiore, S. M., & Sims, V. (2012). The Play Experience Scale: Development and Validation of a Measure of Play. Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, 54(2), 214–225. http://doi.org/10.1177/0018720811434513
Glynn, M. A., & Webster, J. (1992). The Adult Playfulness Scale: An Initial Assessment. Psychological Reports, 71(1), 83–103.
Blanka:
Perhaps the content of the game might be culturally insensitive to that particular child so you may want to investigate that diverse cultural backgrounds in the class and how the game content might be better aligned to them.
Many thanks,
Debra
Hi Blanka,
I think every obstruction requires an in-depth perspective. I don't see any as an "obstruction", I see them as signs that something is not working well. For example,
- If it is ‘not my thing’ or "my own thing", then give them alternatives.
- If it's ‘why oh why” then it wasn't made clear "why" they are doing it.
- ARG sabotage may be what they do in real life too, so it is a great learning opportunity.
Nothing goes as planned or as desired 100% in the classroom, so view these "obstructions" as cues to modify the approach.
Ken
Hi Blanka,
I think every obstruction requires an in-depth perspective. I don't see any as an "obstruction", I see them as signs that something is not working well. For example,
- If it is ‘not my thing’ or "my own thing", then give them alternatives.
- If it's ‘why oh why” then it wasn't made clear "why" they are doing it.
- ARG sabotage may be what they do in real life too, so it is a great learning opportunity.
Nothing goes as planned or as desired 100% in the classroom, so view these "obstructions" as cues to modify the approach.
Ken
Hi Blanka,
I think every obstruction requires an in-depth perspective. I don't see any as an "obstruction", I see them as signs that something is not working well. For example,
- If it is ‘not my thing’ or "my own thing", then give them alternatives.
- If it's ‘why oh why” then it wasn't made clear "why" they are doing it.
- ARG sabotage may be what they do in real life too, so it is a great learning opportunity.
Nothing goes as planned or as desired 100% in the classroom, so view these "obstructions" as cues to modify the approach.
Ken
It looks like you're dealing with college students in a specialized, professional program. Is that right? It matters. Role-playing is inherently -- usually -- fun. I'd expect children to get into it, and I'd expect adults to get into it -- if they have engaged in it for intrinsic reasons, with no grade-related anvils hanging over their heads.
But when you're dealing with adults who are
1) expecting some kind of performance evaluation,
2) required to participate,
3) and, quite importantly, unaccustomed to seeing this particular strategy used in a classroom environment,
then the novelty of the experience becomes a threat rather than a reason for excitement.
I've found that whenever I do anything unexpected while teaching college students, they become quite anxious as they try to figure out what the grade ramifications will be, and they tend to blame the new experience (rather than themselves) for their performance in the course, even when the connection is tenuous. I've had students blame group work that we did in week 8 for the deadlines they missed in week 4. When I point out that the arrow of time doesn't work that way, they get sullen. It's an emotional, rather than a logical, conviction that somehow the experience they perceive as threatening is the root of all of their problems. Those emotional responses can sometimes lead students to do things that seem illogical and self-destructive, including withdraw from participating, skip class, and so forth.
Some suggestions I'd offer, based mostly on my own scar tissue:
1. Even a little research into change management strategies (well-studied in business circles -- see link below) will prove relevant. The emotional state of students in that class isn't terribly different from those of employees watching a shuffling of leadership in a corporation, -- or of faculty hearing that their university is adopting a new assessment system -- and similar strategies related to participation and communication can help defuse some of those issues.
2. If you haven't already tried this (you might have), try running short ARGs with no grades or other consequences on the line other than credit for participation. Acknowledge explicitly that the experience may be unfamiliar and tell them that these activities are warm-ups. Show them how their performance would be evaluated for each of these activities, without the warm-up evaluations counting for anything. That might help them become comfortable with the activity and get to a place where they see it as less threatening.
3. Consider basing any grades or consequences on conventional assignments, essays, tests, or the like, using the experience as material. For instance, they might participate in the activity for only participation credit and then write an essay (which is graded) based on their experience.
4. Do the ARG more than once. After the first one, have an after-action review in which everyone talks about what happened -- what they did and didn't do, and how they might have handled it better. Then run another one. Students often withhold effort on new experiences, and if those experiences only happen once, then all you get to see is them treading water until the threatening new thing is over. When activities repeat, though, the second and subsequent efforts tend to be much better.
5. If I had to hazard a guess, you're asking mostly about a subpopulation that's resisting -- it's not everyone (I hope! :-) ). In fact, if your experience is like mine, it's a minority of the students that you're worrying about here -- maybe a sizable and frustrating minority, but a minority the same. At any rate, there are almost always some good students in the bunch who will get into a new activity. Those folks are useful because students tend to calibrate their own behaviors to what they think their peers are doing. For instance, student academic integrity has been closely tied in research to how honest students think their peers are. When they think most of their peers cheat, they're more likely to do so, too. When they're in places where honest students are highly visible (like honor-code institutions), they're less likely to cheat. You can use this psychology to your (and student) advantage. Finding ways to showcase the students who are doing well -- using them as examples, making them more visible -- often helps a great deal. (When I teach online, I often post statistical overviews showing how often students are logging in, how often they're posting, and how the class is doing on quizzes. These updates never focus on or name individual students, but they help the less-engaged realize that they're not in the majority, and that tends to spur them to catch up.) I realize that with ARG, using this principle is tricky, since the whole idea in ARG is to pretend it's not a game while the simulation is conducted. But if you follow my earlier suggestions about trial runs and warm-ups, you can use the after-action reviews to try to focus the group's attention on the more engaged students. (Disclaimer: I'm not saying to ignore the non-engaged students. But they need to feel like individuals, rather than like members of a larger resisting culture. Talk to the resisting students one-on-one, but talk to the engaged students in front of everyone.)
That's probably a long enough answer at this point. :-) I hope you're able to make the ARGs work. They're a bold enterprise, particularly with pre-professional adults. They may not all appreciate that you're going through the effort to give them an active learning experience instead of a pre-bottled lecture, but I do.
https://hbr.org/2008/07/choosing-strategies-for-change
WOW, thank you. Excellent advice. Indeed I'm dealing with 3rd years bachelor pop music students ( around 20 years old) at the Conservatorium of Amsterdam part of Amsterdam University of the Arts. The ARG is for their second semester and had to include all the content I have been teaching in the previous years so that the credits (study points) stay valid.. This is an art class so already quite threatening for some as the they can not 'hide' behind their instruments or notes but have to get involve in different art media such as theater, dance, collages/assemblages etc. in order to become better musicians.
I can and will repeat the ARG for next year students but there is unfortunately not enough room in the curriculum to repeat it with this class. I'm still not sure if I should eliminate the 'contest' factor because for some that was the fun part of it and others shed away from it.
You are absolutely right in your assumptions that there are also fans of the ARG. Out of my 29 students I would say 8 are highly involved and 10 are truly involved (so 18 in total) , meaning engaged with the fun of the game as well as with the seriousness of the art educational challenges. Unfortunately I had to abort the game and turn back to the individual grading as the school can not allow to give credits when there is lack of study hours. This is the weakness of the gamification that I'm trying to solve hence my question.
I send out a survey to these students, 8% actually admitted not wanting the art class turn into a game. I'm thinking next year I might create a construction where students who do not want to play the game can form their own team outside of the game and do the assignments in the old fashioned way while those seeing the benefits of the game can compete.
And yes the scoreboard was the absolute weak link of my set up and needs total revision so your point 3 is where I will focus on first. As I'm writing my research paper now I am very grateful for your input and the time you spend answering my question in such a profound way. In my research paper I try stay away from the whole 'motivational' theme but it seems when dealing with gamification there is no escaping it. The management strategies seem crucial in this respect.
As the ARG is created to resemble the professional life of an artist/musician the management skills within the teams could also be very important for professional 'band leading' skills. Good bands often fall apart through a lack of managing the 'dysfunctional' elements.
I think part of the problem is my students youthfulness and the romantic vision that comes with it. Playing the game makes them realize how much work is required that is not the 'romantic-making-music' kind but the being-a-professional dealing with a lot of organizing, problem solving and yes managing.
Thank you so much for your support, highly appreciated.
I would like to suggest 2 articles:
1. Pellas, N. (2014). Exploring interrelationships among high School students’ engagement factors in introductory programming courses via a 3D multi-user serious game created in Open Sim. Journal of Universal Computer Science (J.UCS). Special Issue: Immersive Education: What does the future hold? 20(12), 1608-1628.
2. . Pellas, N., Kazanidis, I. Konstantinou, N. & Georgiou, G. (2014). Utilizing a serious game via Open Sim standalone server and Scratch4OS for introductory programming courses in Secondary education: Their effect on student engagement. The 14th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies - ICALT2014 Advanced Technologies for Supporting Open Access to Formal and Informal Learning.
Kind regards
NP
Have you thought about asking students who are engaged WHY they are engaged, and those who are disengaged WHY that is the case? I think that's the only way to get to the heart of the matter.
If the classes are small enough, just informal talk would be useful (something like, "I notice you are not [describe the OBSERVABLE behaviour in non-judgmental terms], and I wonder what would make this a more positive experience for you"
Another approach is to set up a simple online survey (e.g., via SurveyMonkey or some such service) with 3 simple questions, such as "What should be adjusted in the course (or game or whatever) to make this a better experience for you?" and "What do you like about this [name what you are talking about] that should remain the same?" and finally, "Please share any other ideas for the course."
If you do that - informally - it is essential that you acknowledge the suggestions to the class, and be clear that some suggestions, while fruitful, might not be possible.
A final thought is that (like ANY pedagogy that exists in the world!) not all classroom events will engage all students - which is why "differentiated instruction" is such a widely-discussed movement. Individuals react in unique and diverse ways to any given classroom activity. This is trite, but I often think about the adage, "You can please some of the people all of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”.
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