Creating Minimal Video Games for Engineering Education Research

该奖项是根据2009年美国复苏和再投资法案（公法111-5）资助的。该工程教育研究奖授予北方伊利诺伊大学，将聘请研究人员开发和评估一个“最小”游戏的有效性，用于大二水平的工程动力学课程。由于虚拟现实游戏和复杂的模拟环境对青少年和年轻人来说很有趣，并且游戏玩家有动力花时间解决游戏中具有挑战性的复杂问题，因此尝试为工程教育创建类似的环境是合乎逻辑的。虽然使用游戏的学生可能会更投入，并可能在更深的层次上学习材料，但复杂的教育游戏对提高学习效果很重要的具体方面尚不清楚。更简单的“最小”游戏将被开发为一种工具，系统地分离视频游戏的特定方面，以确定这些方面如何以及为什么会改善学习。这项研究解决了重要的问题，为教育用途开发的游戏在工程的有效性，并将为未来的发展提供指导。它将有助于对教育视频游戏的影响和作用的基本理解，这将改善学习，更好地为学生的工程工作做好准备。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5)This engineering education research award to Northern Illinois University will employ researchers to develop and assess the effectiveness of a "minimal" game for use in a sophomore level Engineering Dynamics course. Since virtual reality games and complex simulated environments are interesting to teens and young adults, and game players are motivated to spend time solving challenging complex problems in the games, it is logical to try to create similar environments for engineering education. Although students using games may be more engaged and may learn the material at a deeper level, the specific aspects of complex educational games that are important for improved learning outcomes are not known. The simpler "minimal" game will be developed as an instrument to systematically isolate specific aspects of the video game to determine how and why these aspects improve learning. This research addresses important questions about the effectiveness of games developed for educational use in engineering and will provide guidance for future development. It will contribute significantly to basic understanding of the effects and roles of educational video games which will improve learning and better prepare students for engineering jobs.