An Earthquake Engineering Education Research Methodology for Game-Based Learning

The authors present a research paper about an innovative research and development (R&D) methodology for game-based learning to integrate engineering education and 21 st century learning. Prior to game development, a literature review on gaming revealed a lack of systematic methods for integrating research into design and implementation strategies of many game-based learning environments, much less one for enhancing learners’ understanding of engineering and advancing abilities to think critically, argue scientifically, and use metacognition to analyze strategic thinking. We employed a non-linear, holistic methodology framed by Dick, Carey, and Carey’s instruction-based R&D template to develop a collaborative-competitive board game for middle and high school students, entitled Earthquake. We integrated critical game-design techniques for the game to be enjoyable while increasing players’ knowledge and expertise through repetitive play. The instruction-design template contains five R&D phases: Analyze, Develop, Design, Implement, Evaluate. In the Analyze phase, we established learning objectives to introduce players to earthquake engineering while enhancing critical thinking, scientific argumentation, and metacognition. With learning objectives established, we began the Develop phase for game prototyping, assisted by nine focus groups of experts (n=16) from various backgrounds, including science education, civil engineering, gaming, teaching, and educational administration. We used this resulting prototype in the Design phase for teachers (n=14) to testplay. The use of teacher-participants satisfied fundamental game-design principles: that three to five game-testers sufficiently elucidate mechanical and aesthetic kinks, and that prototype-testers represent a sample of individuals familiar with the context in which the game would eventually be implemented. Four teacher-groups played Earthquake once in a professional development engineering education workshop. Abiding by game-design protocol, each group contained three or four teachers. After the test-play, we conducted semi-structured interviews of each teachergroup. Questions probed what teachers learned about earthquake engineering, what they did and did not like, what they would change, and how effective they thought the game was in teaching interconnectivity of urban infrastructure components. We analyzed interview transcripts with constant comparison qualitative methodology to capture emergent patterns among teachers’ comments. Results indicated needs for more player roles, clarifications in playing cards, and the production of an introductory video to highlight the game’s function. We integrated these Design-based results during the Implement phase to modified Earthquake again for the Evaluate phase. During the Evaluate phase, six high school students formed two groups to play the game twice in one after-school session. Students remained in the same group for both games. We video-recorded students’ game-play for both games. Using a game-based learning checklist (inter-coder reliability of 87%), we analyzed videotapes to identify qualities of students’ dialogue and actions. The checklist served to document and compare evidence of met learning objectives. Our comparisons of first and second plays showed student-gains for earthquake engineering content knowledge, critical thinking, scientific argumentation, and metacognition, thus providing evidence of effectiveness of this particular instructional innovation in advancing students’ knowledge and abilities in engineering. Furthermore, we found the R&D methodology provided an appropriate, systematic framework for integrating research methodologies at every phase in the R&D process.