Learning to code is far from an easy task, it is a promising approach that underscores the use of the video game culture of students to motivate them to invest their time in the practice of programming. The students in this discipline are often discouraged by the amount of information to remember and the complex and constraining syntaxes.…

This article both describes and explains the nature of system simulations--the generation of (non-)numeric models representing characteristics, behaviors, or functions of physical or abstract systems/processes under study. For ease of presentation, I first present some of the most pressing theoretical-practical considerations concerning…

"Civilization V" is part of the best-selling strategy game series, "Sid Meier's Civilization," which is named after its eponymous creator. The goal of all games in the "Civilization" series is to build a historical empire that can stand the test of time, an objective that has made the series an object of affection for…

This paper considers the opportunities and challenges posed to formal second language education given the penetration of digital technologies in young people's daily lives. This paper broadly discusses the issues of information technology (IT) infrastructure, classroom management and IT use restrictions in relations to language learning. The paper…

The potential of games to support language learning and acquisition -- be it in the digital wilds or in the foreign language classroom -- has often been discussed. In this article, I will look at digital games from an explicitly plurilingual perspective. I describe five existing games that demonstrate a plurilingual outlook (Romanica, MElang-E,…

We report a new online suite of tools that enables inquiry-based active-learning activities to develop students' representational competence about atomic orbitals. Orbital Explorer is a Web site for the visualization and interactive investigation of atomic orbital properties. Orbital Explorer contains two integrated tools, namely, Atomic Orbital…

While serious role-play games have been developed for individuals with autism spectrum disorders to learn social interactions and emotions, there is a lack of role-playing games that teach people without autism the necessary communication skills to engage and interact effectively with autistic people. In this research, we present a mobile serious…

Despite the unquestionable academic interest on corpus-based approaches to language education, the use of corpora by teachers in their everyday practice is still not very widespread. One way to promote usage of corpora in language teaching is by making pedagogically appropriate corpora, labelled with different types of problems (for instance,…

The computer game Foldit is currently widely used as a biology and biochemistry teaching aid. Herein, we introduce a new feature of Foldit called "custom contests" that allows educators to create puzzles that fit their curriculum. The effectiveness of the custom contests is demonstrated by the use of five distinct custom contests in an…

Game-based learning has received more focus as a way to engage students and increase interest in mathematics. Game-based learning should be integrated with effective practices for teaching mathematics, though these is a need for further research on effective implementation models. The purpose of this article is to describe two modes of game-based…

Games are a way to engage students with course material in a low-stakes environment. In the popular game app "Heads Up!", participants give clues to a guesser who is holding a word on their forehead. Here, we present a modified version of this game where students are required to give clues in a specific order that emphasizes higher-order…

This paper presents an overview of gamification research. It introduces a panoramic research map that comprises a research map and keyword maps for each year of publication of research on gamification. The panoramic research map resulted in a detailed view of gamification research: covered areas, types of published papers, gaps, and most…

Although there is wide rhetoric that programming should be learnt by all as an element of computational thinking (CT), in practice, it is mostly implemented narrowly as an end in itself consisting of routine practice and traditional testing of the ability to code. This paper discusses a way in which programming could be seen through a wider…

The abstract nature of quantum mechanics makes it difficult to visualize. This is one of the reasons it is taught in the language of mathematics. Without an opportunity to directly observe or interact with quantum phenomena, students struggle to develop conceptual understandings of its theories and formulas. In this paper we present the process of…

A Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) tool is proposed in this manuscript; which consists of an interactive, simple and low-cost computer based simulation and game, with the aim of easing the teaching/learning process regarding the physics concept of projectile motion. The novelty of this proposal relies on the use of a…