Happy Monday everyone. Annie and Vlad here!
We’re pumped to guide you through this exciting OER all about Digital Game and Corporate Simulation Training—where cutting-edge tech meets real-world learning to turbocharge skills, empathy, and inclusion in the workplace. Think of this as your personal F1 race track for mastering how Game and (VR) simulations transform corporate training.
⭐ Access our OER here: https://sites.google.com/view/etec522-digital-games/starting-line-welcome-to-our-oer ⭐
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Here’s what you can expect on this week’s fast-paced journey:
The Race Track — Five Dynamic Stops
You will begin at the Starting Line, navigate five interactive pit stops, each packed with immersive content, quizzes, and challenges designed to shift your perspective and deepen your understanding of Digital Game and Simulation training, before reaching the Finish Line. We recommend pacing yourself, but feel free to hit the accelerator and complete it all at once!
The Race Rules — Points and Prizes
Modeled after a real Grand Prix, in this race, your performance is tracked by Speed (earned through Speed Points), and Quality (earned through Stamina Points).
- Speed Point: Be one of the first 5 racers to complete all 5 stops and return to this thread and leave a final reflection comment. You’ll receive points using a simplified F1-style scoring system:
- 1st: 25 points
- 2nd: 18 points
- 3rd: 15 points
- 4th: 12 points
- 5th: 10 points
- (Anyone finishes after 5th place will get 1 point.)
- Stamina Point: At every phase of the race, there is a small check point, which can either be a quiz or a discussion prompt. Answer these quizzes correctly, contribute to the discussions meaningfully, and you can earn Stamina Points.
- Knowledge Tokens (5 points each): Earn up to 5 points at each of the quiz stops (Stop #2, Stop #4)
- Discussion Stars (10 points each): Earn 10 points per stop for thoughtful contributions to discussion prompts at: (Starting Line, Stop #1, Stop #3, Stop #5)
- Point Tally: At the end of the week, we will announce the Podium Finish and the TOP 3 Racers, based on the total Speed Points and Stamina Points. We hope this will stimulate your learning experience this week.
Final Reflection
Once you have completed the race (well done!!), come back here and leave your thoughts in the comment section below. We’d love for you to take a moment to reflect on your journey. Please share with us your total score + respond to one or more the following questions in this discussion thread:
- What was your biggest takeaway from this OER? Did something challenge your perspective, or give you new insight into simulation-based training?
- Which stop or activity did you find most engaging, and why? Was it a quiz, a case study, a VR example, or something else that stuck with you?
- How did the race format affect your engagement with the material? Did the gamified structure motivate you? Would you recommend it for other topics?
Note: Please leave your total score in the comment, so we can add it to the final leaderboard.
Even though it’s a race, we are a team
Vlad and I will be your Crew for this week, sending you good vibes and helping you answer any questions you may have. We had a great time designing this, and we hope you will enjoy it too. We are also learning, so if there are any glitches or bugs on the OER, we welcome constructive feedback.
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That’s all from us. Are you ready?
On your mark ….
Get set….
GO …!!!
Wow – great work Annie and Vlad! I love how far you took the gamification for this OER, the points system absolutely propelled me through it. Clearly competition through gamification is a major motivator for me, I am itching to see where I land on the leaderboard (although I forgot to tally my own quiz points – my bad!).
My main takeaway was certainly the gamification/simulation spectrum, which I really didn’t appreciate until now. I had not considered how each step of the spectrum leverages different game characteristics in service of different outcomes.
On the subject of competition, an ethical conundrum that arises with “leaderboards” in educational contexts is one around equity. By its nature, someone is at the bottom of the leaderboard. Though for some this can be a catalyst for motivation, for others it is a discouraging highlight of their performance, which may have been good individually but bad relative to their peers. Would this make the competitive aspect of gamification in education a market risk? In your market research, was there any evidence of products which addressed this in any way?