For this blog, I am going to share the resources I discovered in order to teach myself a little bit more about what gamification is. I used a multitude of online resources to try to find the most basic definition of gamification possible and the answer I found that spoke the most to me and made the most sense was:

“The application of typical elements of game playing to other areas of activity, typically as an online marketing technique to encourage engagement with a product or service”

However, this is the simple definition of gamification in general, not when gamification is applied to education specifically. The research involving gamification relating to education was pretty broad as what was considered “educational” and what aspects were said to be “gamification” specifically. The research that we discovered stated that the gamification of learning is an educational approach to motivate students to learn by using video game design and game elements in learning environments. The main goal found to be in implementing gamification in classrooms is to maximize enjoyment and engagement by capturing the interest of learners and inspiring them to continue learning.