Location via proxy:   [ UP ]  
[Report a bug]   [Manage cookies]                
skip to main content
10.1145/3466725.3466755acmotherconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagesfablearnConference Proceedingsconference-collections
research-article
Open access

Designing Effective Playful Experiences for Sustainability Awareness in Schools and Makerspaces

Published: 27 August 2021 Publication History

Abstract

Sustainability awareness in young people, and especially students, is growing in importance. To this end, serious games and playful experiences are used to enable students and teachers to actively study climate change issues and respective challenges. Many approaches have been proposed, ranging from quiz-based web applications to full-blown game experiences. We discuss several related design aspects through the lens of our own experience with gamification inside educational environments. Our results derive from the use of a playful web application focusing on sustainability and energy issues, developed within the GAIA project and used in 25 schools with 3762 registered users. We also present results from surveys answered by 723 students and 32 educators. Our findings show that a simple playful experience can yield good results within educational environments when taking into account their constraints, integrating the intervention to schools’ everyday life and placing it within a strategy that includes other tools.

References

[1]
2015. Europe’s buildings under the microscope: A country-by-country review of the energy performance of buildings. Technical Report. Buildings Performance Institute Europe (BPIE). ISBN: 9789491143014.
[2]
2015. Evans S., Global reaction: the Paris agreement on climate change. Carbon Brief Online Analysis. Available at https://www.carbonbrief.org/the-paris-agreement-on-climate-change-the-world-reacts (Accessed 17 Feb 2021).
[3]
2020. Energy efficiency and behavioural change: Reducing carbon footprint through ICT and sustainable actions, https://cordis.europa.eu/article/id/421856-energy-efficiency-and-behavioural-change.
[4]
2020. Energy performance of buildings directive (2018/844/EU), https://ec.europa.eu/energy/topics/energy-efficiency/energy-efficient-buildings/energy-performance-buildings-directive_en.
[5]
2020. Games4Sustainability: Sustainability through serious games, https://games4sustainability.org.
[6]
2020. Green Awareness in Action, Horizon 2020 project. Available online: http://gaia-project.eu.
[7]
accessed online March 2021. Matomo Analytics, https://matomo.org/.
[8]
(accessed online May 2021). Entropy project website, http://entropy-project.eu.
[9]
accessed online May 2021. Game mechanics, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_mechanics.
[10]
(accessed online May 2021). Greensoul, Persuasive Eco-awareness for User Engagement through Networked Data Devices, http://www.greensoul-h2020.eu/.
[11]
accessed online May 2021. The GAIA Challenge, https://gaia-challenge.com/.
[12]
(accessed online May 2021). Tribe H2020 project, http://tribe-h2020.eu/.
[13]
Spartaco Albertarelli, Piero Fraternali, Sergio Herrera, Mark Melenhorst, Jasminko Novak, Chiara Pasini, Andrea-Emilio Rizzoli, and Cristina Rottondi. 2018. A Survey on the Design of Gamified Systems for Energy and Water Sustainability. Games 9, 3 (2018). https://doi.org/10.3390/g9030038
[14]
Steven K Ayer, John I Messner, and Chimay J Anumba. 2016. Augmented reality gaming in sustainable design education. Journal of Architectural Engineering 22, 1 (2016), 04015012.
[15]
Jackie Barnes, Amy K Hoover, Borna Fatehi, Jesus Moreno-Leon, Gillian Smith, and Casper Harteveld. 2017. Exploring emerging design patterns in student-made climate change games. In Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games. 1–6.
[16]
Sebastian Deterding, Dan Dixon, Rilla Khaled, and Lennart Nacke. 2011. From Game Design Elements to Gamefulness: Defining Gamification. Proceedings of the 15th International Academic MindTrek Conference: Envisioning Future Media Environments, MindTrek 2011 11, 9–15. https://doi.org/10.1145/2181037.2181040
[17]
Christo Dichev and Darina Dicheva. 2017. Gamifying education: what is known, what is believed and what remains uncertain: a critical review. International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education 14 (12 2017). https://doi.org/10.1186/s41239-017-0042-5
[18]
Tawanna Dillahunt, Olga Lyra, Mary L Barreto, and Evangelos Karapanos. 2017. Reducing children’s psychological distance from climate change via eco-feedback technologies. International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction 13 (2017), 19–28.
[19]
N. Dimitriou, A. Garbi, K. Vasilakis, A. Schoofs, A. Taha, M. Nikiforakis, S. Kotsilitis, T. G. Papaioannou, D. Kotsopoulos, C. Bardaki, F. Pursche, and N. Deliyski. 2018. ChArGED: Implementing a framework for improving energy efficiency in public buildings through IoTenabled energy disaggregation and serious games. In 2018 IEEE International Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications Workshops (PerCom Workshops). 65–70.
[20]
Alysson Diniz dos Santos, Francesco Strada, and Andrea Bottino. 2018. Approaching sustainability learning via digital serious games. IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies 12, 3 (2018), 303–320.
[21]
Michael Horn, Pryce Davis, Amartya Banerjee, and Reed Stevens. 2020. Fight the Power! Games, Thermostats, and the Energy Patriarchy. International Journal of Designs for Learning 11, 2 (2020), 118–129.
[22]
Michael Stephen Horn, Amartya Banerjee, Pryce Davis, and Reed Stevens. 2016. Invasion of the Energy Monsters: A Spooky Game About Saving Energy. In Games+ Learning+ Society Conference, Vol. 12. 1851–1860.
[23]
Robin Hunicke, Marc Leblanc, and Robert Zubek. 2004. MDA: A Formal Approach to Game Design and Game Research. AAAI Workshop - Technical Report 1 (01 2004).
[24]
Daniel Johnson, Ella Horton, Rory Mulcahy, and Marcus Foth. 2017. Gamification and serious games within the domain of domestic energy consumption: A systematic review. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 73 (06 2017), 249–264. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2017.01.134
[25]
Daniel Johnson, Ella Horton, Rory Mulcahy, and Marcus Foth. 2017. Gamification and serious games within the domain of domestic energy consumption: A systematic review. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 73 (06 2017), 249–264. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2017.01.134
[26]
Erik Knol and Peter De Vries. 2011. EnerCities - A Serious Game to Stimulate Sustainability and Energy Conservation: Preliminary Results. eLearning Papers (07 2011).
[27]
Alex Laskey and Ogi Kavazovic. 2011. OPOWER. XRDS 17, 4 (June 2011), 47–51. https://doi.org/10.1145/1961678.1961687
[28]
Zdenko Mago. 2019. Increasing Awareness and Learning About Eco-Innovations Through Digital Games. In European Conference on Games Based Learning. Academic Conferences International Limited, 1013–1015.
[29]
Alan Meier, Cecilia Aragon, Therese Peffer, Daniel Perry, and Marco Pritoni. 2011. Usability of residential thermostats: Preliminary investigations. Building and Environment 46, 10 (2011), 1891–1898.
[30]
Luca Morganti, Federica Pallavicini, Elena Cadel, Antonio Candelieri, Francesco Archetti, and Fabrizia Mantovani. 2017. Gaming for Earth: Serious games and gamification to engage consumers in pro-environmental behaviours for energy efficiency. Energy Research & Social Science 29 (2017), 95 – 102. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.erss.2017.05.001
[31]
G. Mylonas, D. Amaxilatis, I. Chatzigiannakis, A. Anagnostopoulos, and F. Paganelli. 2018. Enabling Sustainability and Energy Awareness in Schools Based on IoT and Real-World Data. IEEE Pervasive Computing 17, 4 (Oct.-Dec. 2018), 53–63. https://doi.org/10.1109/MPRV.2018.2873855
[32]
Georgios Mylonas, Dimitrios Amaxilatis, Lidia Pocero, Iraklis Markelis, Joerg Hofstaetter, and Pavlos Koulouris. 2019. An educational IoT lab kit and tools for energy awareness in European schools. International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction 20 (2019), 43 – 53. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijcci.2019.03.003
[33]
Sofia Papavlasopoulou, Michail N. Giannakos, and Letizia Jaccheri. 2017. Empirical studies on the Maker Movement, a promising approach to learning: A literature review. Entertainment Computing 18 (2017), 57–78. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.entcom.2016.09.002
[34]
Filomena Pietrapertosa, Marco Tancredi, Monica Salvia, Monica Proto, Angelo Pepe, Michele Giordano, Nicola Afflitto, Giuliano Sarricchio, Senatro Di Leo, and Carmelina Cosmi. 2021. An educational awareness program to reduce energy consumption in schools. Journal of Cleaner Production 278 (2021), 123949. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.123949
[35]
Gillian Puttick and Eli Tucker-Raymond. 2018. Building systems from scratch: An exploratory study of students learning about climate change. Journal of Science Education and Technology 27, 4 (2018), 306–321.
[36]
Michael Ro, Markus Brauer, Kathy Kuntz, Raj Shukla, and Ingo Bensch. 2017. Making Cool Choices for sustainability: Testing the effectiveness of a game-based approach to promoting pro-environmental behaviors. Journal of Environmental Psychology 53 (06 2017). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2017.06.007
[37]
Michael Ro, Markus Brauer, Kathy Kuntz, Raj Shukla, and Ingo Bensch. 2017. Making Cool Choices for sustainability: Testing the effectiveness of a game-based approach to promoting pro-environmental behaviors. Journal of Environmental Psychology 53 (2017), 20 – 30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2017.06.007
[38]
Mara Soekarjo and H. Oostendorp. 2015. Measuring Effectiveness of Persuasive Games Using an Informative Control Condition. International Journal of Serious Games 2 (06 2015). https://doi.org/10.17083/ijsg.v2i2.74
[39]
Giovanni Maria Troiano, Qinyu Chen, Ángela Vargas Alba, Gregorio Robles, Gillian Smith, Michael Cassidy, Eli Tucker-Raymond, Gillian Puttick, and Casper Harteveld. 2020. Exploring How Game Genre in Student-Designed Games Influences Computational Thinking Development. In Proceedings of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 1–17.
[40]
Femke van Horen, Arianne van der Wal, and Amir Grinstein. 2018. Green, Greener, Greenest: Can Competition Increase Sustainable Behavior?Journal of Environmental Psychology 59 (08 2018). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2018.08.007
[41]
Rob van Roy and Bieke Zaman. 2017. Why Gamification Fails in Education and How to Make It Successful: Introducing Nine Gamification Heuristics Based on Self-Determination Theory. 485 – 509. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51645-5_22
[42]
Rob van Roy and Bieke Zaman. 2018. Need-supporting gamification in education: An assessment of motivational effects over time. Computers & Education 127 (08 2018). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2018.08.018
[43]
Catherine Walker. 2017. Tomorrow’s leaders and today’s agents of change? Children, sustainability education and environmental governance. Children & Society 31, 1 (2017), 72–83.
[44]
Devon Wemyss, Roberta Castri, Francesca Cellina, Vanessa De Luca, Evelyn Lobsiger, and Vicente Carabias-Hutter. 2018. Examining community-level collaborative vs. competitive approaches to enhance household electricity-saving behavior. Energy Efficiency 11 (06 2018), 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12053-018-9691-z
[45]
Dong Zhao, Andrew Mccoy, Jing Du, and Philip Agee. 2017. Interaction Effects of Building Technology and Resident Behavior on Energy Consumption in Residential Buildings. Energy and Buildings 134 (01 2017), 223–233. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enbuild.2016.10.049

Cited By

View all
  • (2024)Setting Up a Home “Making Space” After Professional and Academic-Based Ones Built for Everyday Learning, Creativity, and InnovationComputational Practices and Applications for Digital Art and Crafting10.4018/979-8-3693-2927-6.ch005(95-136)Online publication date: 30-Jun-2024
  • (2024)Sustainability in Education Technology DesignPromoting Multi-Sector Sustainability With Policy and Innovation10.4018/979-8-3693-2113-3.ch004(90-121)Online publication date: 20-May-2024
  • (2024)A Playful Path to Sustainability: Synthesizing design strategies for children's environmental sustainability learning through gameful interventionsProceedings of the 23rd Annual ACM Interaction Design and Children Conference10.1145/3628516.3655797(201-217)Online publication date: 17-Jun-2024
  • Show More Cited By
  1. Designing Effective Playful Experiences for Sustainability Awareness in Schools and Makerspaces

    Recommendations

    Comments

    Information & Contributors

    Information

    Published In

    cover image ACM Other conferences
    FabLearn Europe / MakeEd 2021: FabLearn Europe / MakeEd 2021 - An International Conference on Computing, Design and Making in Education
    June 2021
    148 pages
    ISBN:9781450389891
    DOI:10.1145/3466725
    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives International 4.0 License.

    Publisher

    Association for Computing Machinery

    New York, NY, United States

    Publication History

    Published: 27 August 2021

    Permissions

    Request permissions for this article.

    Check for updates

    Author Tags

    1. Empirical studies
    2. Energy awareness
    3. Gamification
    4. Internet of Things
    5. Sustainability

    Qualifiers

    • Research-article
    • Research
    • Refereed limited

    Funding Sources

    Conference

    FabLearn Europe / MakeEd 2021

    Acceptance Rates

    Overall Acceptance Rate 14 of 35 submissions, 40%

    Contributors

    Other Metrics

    Bibliometrics & Citations

    Bibliometrics

    Article Metrics

    • Downloads (Last 12 months)251
    • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)29
    Reflects downloads up to 27 Jan 2025

    Other Metrics

    Citations

    Cited By

    View all
    • (2024)Setting Up a Home “Making Space” After Professional and Academic-Based Ones Built for Everyday Learning, Creativity, and InnovationComputational Practices and Applications for Digital Art and Crafting10.4018/979-8-3693-2927-6.ch005(95-136)Online publication date: 30-Jun-2024
    • (2024)Sustainability in Education Technology DesignPromoting Multi-Sector Sustainability With Policy and Innovation10.4018/979-8-3693-2113-3.ch004(90-121)Online publication date: 20-May-2024
    • (2024)A Playful Path to Sustainability: Synthesizing design strategies for children's environmental sustainability learning through gameful interventionsProceedings of the 23rd Annual ACM Interaction Design and Children Conference10.1145/3628516.3655797(201-217)Online publication date: 17-Jun-2024
    • (2024)Making It Work—Experiences of Women Who Engage in Technological Making at HomeInteracting with Computers10.1093/iwc/iwae01136:1(30-47)Online publication date: 8-May-2024
    • (2022)Gamifying Decision Support Systems to Promote Inclusive and Engaged Urban Resilience PlanningUrban Planning10.17645/up.v7i2.49877:2Online publication date: 29-Apr-2022
    • (2022)Review of Demand Response and Energy Communities in Serious GamesIEEE Access10.1109/ACCESS.2022.320201310(91018-91026)Online publication date: 2022

    View Options

    View options

    PDF

    View or Download as a PDF file.

    PDF

    eReader

    View online with eReader.

    eReader

    HTML Format

    View this article in HTML Format.

    HTML Format

    Login options

    Figures

    Tables

    Media

    Share

    Share

    Share this Publication link

    Share on social media