Studies of educational games often treat them as "black boxes" (Black and Wiliam in Phi Delta Kappan 80: 139-48, 1998; Buckley et al. in Int J LearnTechnol 5:166-190, 2010; Buckley et al. in J Sci Educ Technol 13: 23-41, 2010) and measure their effectiveness by exposing a treatment group of students to the game and comparing their…

Much research attention has been focused on learning through game playing. However, very little has been focused on student learning through game making, especially in science. Moreover, none of the studies on learning through making games has presented an account of how students engage in the process of game design in real time. The present study…

Digital games have become more involved in our lives and entertainment culture with the development of technology. Digital games, which individuals of all ages play and derive great enjoyment from at the the same time, have been actively used in educational activities. However, it is seen that the games used in the education process are mostly…

Game-based learning has attracted great interest in science education as an effective way to increase student achievement. Most studies in this field have focused on digital or non-digital games. In the literature, some studies generally compare educational games with traditional teaching methods. More studies need to be conducted to compare the…

Computational thinking (CT) is an analytical thinking approach to solving daily problems by utilizing fundamental concepts of computer science. In the past decade, CT has been regarded as an essential life skill to be taught to everyone, especially young learners. One overarching and unresolved issue related to including CT into the K-12…

Research on learning analytics (LA) has focused mostly at the university level. LA research in the K-12 setting is needed. This study aimed to understand 4,115 middle school students' learning paths based on their behavioural patterns and the relationship with performance levels when they used a digital learning game as their science curriculum.…

Digital games are among the most common reasons children use the internet, and the time children spend playing digital games is increasing day by day. This research aims to identify the characteristics of the digital games most preferred by children, while also examining their digital gaming habits. The study was conducted using a qualitative…

This article builds on prior work that aims to measure computational learning (CL) during middle school. Since game computational sophistication (GCS) has been used as a proxy for a student's engagement in CL we build on their model to more completely describe the relationship between different types of building blocks of computer games and GCS.…

Game-based learning refers to establishing learning environments that involve digital or non-digital games to enhance students' knowledge and skill acquisition. Previous studies indicated that game-based learning is superior to the conventional instructional method, but few compared the differences between different game types. This study examined…

In order to help students become scientifically literate citizens, science education should allow them to gain a more concrete understanding of the potential social and ethical impacts of scientific and technological change. Using Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as an imaginative tool, we designed simple hands-on activities and a digital narrative…

In this study, which is based on the fact that the nature of learning is and should be understood on the basis of social constructivism, interaction and collaboration in language development are explored and digital games are discussed as an instructional technology. For digital games developed with learning in mind, the effects of educational…

There is an established gender gap in middle school math education, where female students report higher anxiety and lower engagement, which negatively impact their performance and even long-term career choices. This work investigates the role of digital learning games in addressing this issue by studying Decimal Point, a math game that teaches…

This preliminary study examined whether distinct student profiles (N = 760) emerged based on their behavioral patterns in an online algebraic learning game. We applied k-means clustering analysis to clickstream data collected in the game and then examined how students' behavioral patterns varied across the clusters using data visualization. The…

This paper demonstrated how to apply Machine Learning (ML) techniques to analyze student interaction data collected in an online mathematics game. Using a data-driven approach, we examined 1) how different ML algorithms influenced the precision of middle-school students' (N = 359) performance (i.e. posttest math knowledge scores) prediction and 2)…

Does a teachable agent influence the uptake or neglect of 'critical constructive feedback' and learning within a digital environment? 285 middle-school students engaged with a history learning game in a 2x2 study design. One dimension was inclusion of a teachable agent. Orthogonal was whether critical constructive feedback was presented…