UNFOLDING LEARNING BEHAVIORS: A SEQUENTIAL ANALYSIS APPROACH IN A GAME-BASED LEARNING ENVIRONMENT

Abstract

During the past two decades, conducting game-based learning research poses several predicaments. In particular, two primary challenges have been raised: the lack of long-term intervention in a real world and the lack of the revelation of learning process for understanding students’ engagement. Hence, in order to overcome the two challenges gradually, a previous study developed a game-based learning environment, entitled My-Pet-My-Quest (MPMQ), for arithmetic practices. The MPMQ provides pet-keeping tasks and learning tasks, so that students can play the role of pet-keepers who can interact with their virtual pets and solve a series of small quests that sustain students’ motivation and engagement. For understanding students’ behaviors in the environment, two processes were carried out. This study first attempted to implement long-term intervention in an elementary after- school club as well as students’ home, and then to analyze the learning process. Furthermore, this study adopted a sequential analysis approach, based on a designing framework, to help us examine and understand the each aspect of behaviors in students’ learning and playing. These results can provide suggestions and references for the design of efficient game-based learning environments in the future.