This way, learners have an opportunity to learn while having

fun, which makes their experience more memorable and

engaging.

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Gamify Your eLearning With These 5 Tips

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By Emily Gore
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September 5, 2022
Comments
7 minutes to read

Summary: Gamifying eLearning courses can help

learners retain more information and engage better
with content. Read on to discover five ways to do just
that!

Gamification: Engagement, Retention, And More

Pop quiz: what do some of the world’s largest corporations, like

Google, Microsoft, Cisco, Deloitte, Sun Microsystems, IBM,
L’Oreal, Canon, Lexus, FedEx, UPS, and Wells Fargo, who
represent a broad array of industries, have in common? Answer:
gamification and game-based learning!

Gamification is the process of applying game design elements

to non-game contexts. It’s used in education for many reasons,
including motivating learners to complete assignments and
improve grades.

To Gamify Or Not To Gamify?

That is, indeed, the big question. However, judging by the data
alone, one can’t be faulted for leaning toward gamification.
Due to its effectiveness in producing greater learner
engagement and better overall learning outcomes, over the
past decade or so there’s been tremendous interest in game-
based learning. According to one source:

• 80% of the US workforce is convinced of the more engaging

qualities of game-based learning

• 83% of employees feel more motivated at work following a

gamified training experience

• Gamification improves employee engagement by over 60%

• Because of its inherently higher-quality training features,

gamification improves productivity by over 50%

• Companies that do employ gamification as part of their

L&D strategy enjoy much higher conversion rates: over
700%
Corporations and their employees are convinced that
gamification is worth the investment, and the gamification
industry agrees with their assessment. In 2020, the industry had
a value of $9.1 billion. According to industry watchers, that
figure is set to explode to $30.7 billion by 2025, expanding at a
compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 27.4%. Other
estimates put the CAGR between 2020 and 2030 at a brisk
24.2% clip. By 2024, education and game-based learning
solution providers will earn over $24 million in annual revenues.

This evidence-based assessment of the state of the union of

gamification and its allied industries, therefore, undeniably
confirms the value of gamification. So, perhaps, the real
question shouldn’t be whether to gamify or not, but how to do it
more effectively. And, like other learning strategies, the more
well-thought-out your approach to gamifying your learning
content, the more effective will be the learning outcomes you’ll
achieve. Here are five tips to help you gamify your eLearning.

5 Tips To Gamify Your eLearning

1. Create An Interactive Game Outline

An interactive game outline is a visual representation of the

game you plan to develop. This helps you organize your ideas
and keep track of what needs to happen next. You can use a
simple spreadsheet or a free online tool like Google Sheets. The
best way to use game outlines effectively is to develop reusable
templates with the following characteristics:

• Keep it simple
The golden rule is to keep gamification simple, so as not to
overwhelm your audience. To do that, choose an outline with
minimal complexities. However, keep in mind that while
gamification must be fun, it shouldn’t make learning overly
simple (i.e., non-challenging).
 • Use templates based on course learning objectives
For instance, learn/recall-type lessons require simple, list-
type template functionality. Learn/apply-type modules,
however, might require more elaborate outlines, involving
lots of practice and exercises.

• Use outlines with appropriate game mechanics

Outlines serve as the blueprint for gamifying your courses
and, therefore, must contain all the gaming elements you
plan to leverage in your course, for example, "hints",
"dollars", "unlockable content", "totems" etc. Modules that
teach individual skills may require a different set of game
mechanics than those involving team play or group
challenges.

It's important that each outline clearly defines the "rules of

engagement" for the game at the outset. These rules serve two
important purposes when gamifying your learning content.
Firstly, they’ll help users engage with the interactive gaming
elements you add to your content. More importantly, though,
they’ll help L&D content creators to quickly assess whether the
template is the right fit for gamifying their lessons/modules.

2. Add Challenges And Rewards

A good gamification strategy includes challenges and rewards.

Challenge yourself to complete an activity within a certain
timeframe. Reward yourself when you meet those goals. Not all
challenges must, however, be time-based. Other challenges to
consider include accomplishing certain strategic objectives—
such as earning a specific dollar value in profit by the end of a
module, or closing the highest number of deals in each lesson.

So, what types of rewards do learners most prefer in gamified

learning? Researchers concluded that of the population of
learners surveyed:

• Only a small section, 2%, preferred virtual currency rewards

 • The vast majority, 30%, enjoyed the thrill of progressing to
the next level of a challenge

• 27% liked collecting points and higher scores during

challenges

• 26% were in the challenge so they might be rewarded with

real-time feedback on their performance

Other rewards and recognition features include badges and

avatars, leaderboards, performance graphs, and progress
meters/bars that act as motivators for individual and team
players. Regardless of what game mechanics you use to lay out
the challenges, it’s important to motivate and engage your
learners by rewarding them for participating in the challenge.

3. Include Visual Aids

Gamification leverages appealing design and aesthetic

elements to draw learners into participating in the game. One
of the easiest ways to make learning fun is by adding visual
aids. This can range from simple things like using images to
illustrate concepts to more complex things like creating games.
Here are some gamification best practices when deciding what
visual aids to include:

• Design visual "hooks"

The most engaging gamification elements are those with
"hooks" that draw learners to try them out. Your learning
content should inspire you on the motif or theme for the
visuals you choose.

• Don’t ignore typographic elements

Font colors, pitch, size, and other typographical elements
can enhance the visual appeal of your gamification efforts.
Use script or handwriting fonts to convey special
instructions, while regular styling can be used to
communicate other instructions within the game. Caution:
don’t go overboard with fonts and typefaces as that may
 impact the "seriousness" of the game.

• Visual-enable game navigation

While text-based drop-down navigational features are
simple to implement, adding intuitive icons to help
learners/players navigate through the game can be a great
strategy. Caution: regardless of what icons or images you
use as visual aids in your game, it’s important to standardize
and use them consistently.

• Visual pointers and assistance

Use visual cues, help aids, and pointers throughout the
game, so that learners don’t have to stress about what’s
next or how to proceed within a specific situation. Sure, they
could navigate to the help screen, or refer to online
documentation, but clicking on a designated icon or avatar
is far easier.

4. Incorporate Social Media Interactions

There has been academic research, conducted in the context

of students in higher-learning settings (universities/doctoral
studies), which:

…revealed that online social media used for collaborative

learning had a significant impact on interactivity with
peers, teachers, and online knowledge sharing behavior…
Additionally, interactivity with teachers, peers, and online
knowledge sharing behavior has seen a significant impact
on students’ engagement which consequently has a
significant impact on students’ academic performance.

An easy way, therefore, to add interactivity to an eLearning

course is through social media interactions. Learners can share
what they learn with friends and family via Facebook, Twitter,
etc. They can also ask questions and receive answers from
other learners. A real-world example of such social interactions
is the social networking platform LinkedIn and its learning
portal LinkedIn Learning—where users network, share
knowledge and experiences, and learn from each other. Other
social media elements that learning content developers can
incorporate into their content include:

• Polling via Twitter

• Live Facebook/TikTok video posts

• Encouraging user-generated content (UGC) on social media

pages

• Using social media treasure hunts, and posting trivia

questions on social media

• Giving recognition to learners with badges for "liking",

viewing, or commenting on lesson content

According to researchers, although the use of social media

features (such as badges, likes, follows, etc.) don’t resemble
actual games, their use in gamified learning taps into the same
"psychological and phenomenological properties with gaming."
eLearning content developers can thus tap into those
similarities, to leverage social networking, to persuade learners
to better engage with social learning content.

5. Provide Feedback

Regardless of the type of learning intervention implemented,

instructors and learners both benefit a lot from comments,
critiques, and observations from each other. When
incorporating gamification into your learning, the same rules
apply. If you’re using gamification techniques in your eLearning
courses, make sure to provide feedback to your learners. This
will encourage them to keep up with the material and give them
a chance to improve their performance.

Immediate feedback about learner performance can be as

simple as a thumbs-up or thumbs-down icon. However, the best
practice also dictates that providing additional, more extensive
feedback—such as specific deficiencies and/or strengths—can
help learners to better understand critical concepts from within
the gamified learning content.

Additionally, open up the feedback loop to also receive

comments and assessments about various aspects of the
course. This will enable you/your team to modify gamification
elements that learners don’t find useful, and it’ll also help you
accentuate and enhance gaming aspects that are a hit.

Parting Thoughts

In the context of adult eLearning, gamification is the

application of game mechanics that enhance the learning
experience. Compared to non-gamified materials, gamification
improves knowledge retention, enhances engagement with the
course, heightens learner motivation, and results in better
knowledge transfer to the workplace.

While gamifying a particularly "dry" subject can "spice" it up

and make it more fun for the learner, it also helps the learners
develop real-world skills, such as critical thinking, problem-
solving, team collaboration, and social engagement. By
implementing the five gamification techniques discussed in this
post, L&D teams can create eLearning that produces better
overall learning outcomes.

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