The aim of this systematic literature review is to examine the empirical evidence within the field of Digital Game-based Learning (DGBL) concerning teachers’ beliefs and experiences about digital games in relation to the different barriers that prevent them from using them in the classroom. The search yielded a total of 152 results, from which a total of 27 articles were included in the present study. A thematic analysis was used to interpret the data which led to the formation of a variety of codes, sub-themes, and themes. The results go into detail into all of these, detailing different intrinsic and extrinsic barriers, teachers’ positive and negative beliefs in conjunction with the influence of demographic factors as well as education. The discussion is based on the relationships that arose between the themes and sub-themes which is further supplemented by the theories on beliefs and barriers in relation to technology integration which are presented in the background section. The results show that there is a bi-directional relationship between teachers’ beliefs and the barriers they face in the use of digital games in education as compounding barriers lead to or exacerbate negative beliefs while positive beliefs can lead to certain barriers being overcome. Both pre-service education and professional development have proven successful in improving teacher beliefs and confidence, however, the influence of extrinsic barriers results in many teachers believing that the use of digital games is too difficult or impossible in practice. Finally, the influence of demographic factors such as age, gender, and experience are discussed, with the latter being especially influential in terms of teachers’ beliefs.

Young people in Sweden today spend a significant amount of time in front of computers playing games, and gaming has gained a negative reputation both in the public domain as well as within the field of education. The aim of this overview is to see whether gamification, the use of video games or parts of video games, can be a valuable tool for educators to increase student motivation, engagement and knowledge of history. Two main areas are in focus in this overview. The first area focuses on whether gamification can be used to increase student motivation, engagement and understanding of history. The second area focuses on how the previously mentioned goals can be achieved through gamification, and what teachers wanting to use gamification have to take into consideration to make the use of it successful.  To conduct this research, the databases Libsearch and SwePub have been used alongside books from Malmö Universities library.  This overview led me to the conclusion that gamification can be a valuable asset, and there are instances where it has been proven to contribute to student motivation, engagement and knowledge of history. However, the technology used when implementing gamification can be considered difficult to use by some. Regarding the use of gamification, this overview shows that multiple factors matter when using gamification. These are factors that teachers must take into consideration for the gamification to be a useful and successful tool.

To increase student engagement in their classroom, the author created an art curriculum using gamification methods that incorporates elements of tabletop role-playing games. The Role-playing Art Curriculum is a key element of this thesis. Possible research approaches involving game-based learning and gamification were examined to point toward future research and reflection regarding games and game-like content into an art curriculum. Action research methods were used to create and run the Role-playing Art Curriculum. The author concludes that the gamified curriculum took extra preparation and required more management to run then other traditional art curriculums.

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Yes / The unique characteristics of games have led scientific research to increasingly focus on their potential role in learning processes. Currently, their effectiveness in fostering experiential learning and skill acquisition in several areas is already supported by the existing evidence, mainly about the potential of digital games. Paradoxically, the current post-digital era seems to have led to a growing popularity of analogue games. The present Systematic Literature Review aimed to map the existing literature on the potential of board, tabletop, or other analogue games in learning processes. It intended to systematize the contemporary state of the art (2012-2022) around the pedagogical role of these games, their effectiveness, the promoted learning outcomes, the methodological aspects of the interventions, the used games – including mechanics and other characteristics – and the current discussions around inclusion and accessibility in analogue game-based learning. Adopting the PRISMA methodology, we searched ACM Digital Library, EBSCO, ERIC, Scopus - Elsevier, and Web of Science databases, as well as other peer-reviewed “grey literature” sources. The search resulted in an initial sample of 2741 articles that was then screened by inclusion and exclusion criteria previously defined according to the research objectives. We obtained a final sample of 45 articles. To formulate the mapping of existing research, these studies were analyzed using a combination of statistical, content, and critical analysis procedures. The obtained results support the role of board, tabletop, and other analogue games in educational contexts – based on their educational potential – with a broad range of knowledge, cognitive, and psychological outcomes. The study also emphasized the relevance of these games in the promotion of soft skills and other aspects typically associated with meaningful learning, such as engagement, satisfaction, flexibility, and freedom of experimentation. However, important limitations were found in a fair amount of the pedagogical approaches studied, which can be mostly attributed to the low prevalence of modern board games that relate what is intended to be learned to aspects of game design and have little to no consideration of accessibility and inclusion aspects in these studies. / The present work was developed in the scope of the Project Training the Educators to Facilitate the Teaching and Assessment of Abstract Syllabus by the Use of Serious Games – TEGA (2020-1- UK01-KA203-079248), funded by the European Commission on the scope of Erasmus+ Programme. The research team also acknowledges the funding by Fundação para a Ciência e para a Tecnologia (FCT) provided to CICANT R&D Unit (UIDB/05260/2020), on the scope of Verão com Ciência initiative, which allowed the inclusion of a research initiation grant holder as co-author of the present work.

The impact of the learner flow experience (LFE) on learning outcomes has been studied for over four decades in a variety of formal and informal instructional settings, including the digital game-based learning (DGBL) environment. Since 2011, the examination of the LFE and its impact on learning outcomes has expanded to computer science-related disciplines, as well as other research communities. During this expansion, an increase in the number and definitions of terms related to the LFE has occurred. Likewise, the number of assessment tools used to capture evidence of the flow experience in learners playing DGBLs has increased. This integrative review examined 66 peer-reviewed articles published between 2011 and 2021, which reported the results of empirical studies seeking to identify and measure the learner experience of flow during DGBL gameplay. More specifically, this study sought to understand how the LFE and its dimensions were conceptualized and assessed in those articles. To do this, the relevant data was extracted from the articles, and, via iterative processes of analyses, the information related to the conceptualization and assessment of the LFE during DGBL game play was identified, analyzed, and organized. The study's findings demonstrated that the number of terms used to describe the LFE dimensions increased during the time period studied, and that there is seemingly little consensus with regard to the conceptualization of the terms or their use in the assessment instruments applied. However, this study also revealed that these terms and the methods by which they were assessed may be examined within the theoretical structure defined by Csikszentmihalyi in 1990, in which he codified nine dimensions to explain the flow experience. These dimensions are: (1) balance of skills and challenge; (2) clear goals; (3) swift, unambiguous feedback; (4) merging of action and awareness; (5) concentration on the task at hand; (6) sense of control; (7) distorted sense of time; (8) loss of ego; and (9) autotelic experience. Organizing the research question findings within this structure enabled the identification of themes of and synonyms for the nine flow dimensions with the addition of the construct flow experience. To encourage future researchers' ability to interpret, compare, and contrast studies of the experience of the LFE during gameplay in the DGBL learning environment, a set of researcher guides was developed following an iterative process of comparisons and analysis across the research questions' findings. These guides present a description of each of the flow dimensions, associated key words and/or key phrases, synonyms for the dimension, and statements or questions used to solicit information from learners regarding their experience of each of the flow dimensions, organized by theorist. The goal for these researcher guides is that they will be used as references for future studies of the impact of flow on learning outcomes for DGBL players through providing a common vocabulary and set of assessment items. They also may help encourage and enhance collaboration between instructional designers and DGBL game designers in creating effective DGBLs that increase learning or user engagement and enjoyment through the fostering of conditions that enable the LFE phenomenon. / Doctor of Philosophy / Many adults recall losing track of time during play as children. Achieving the feeling of being in "the zone" during play or competition was anticipated and relished. As adults, the desire to recapture that state of being blissfully unaware of time, focused only in the moment and free from any concerns frequently drives sales of sporting equipment, leisure activities, and electronically-based games. This experience, called the flow state, can happen when engaging in a wide variety of activities, including learning. Research has shown that if a student reaches the flow state while learning, they learn more and derive greater satisfaction throughout the learning process. This has also been found to be the case for students engaging with digital game-based learning (DGBL) applications. But how do we know if a DGBL player has entered the flow state? Researchers in the fields of instructional design and game design have asked and sought to answer this very question. This study examined the works of these researchers to understand specifically how the flow state was defined and measured in their studies. As a result of this study, researcher guides were created to explain how the learner flow experience and its component dimensions are identified and described, as well as to provide questions that could be posed to students to help evaluate if the flow state was achieved during DGBL gameplay. The goal for these guides is that they will be used as references for future studies of the impact of flow on learning outcomes for DGBL players through providing a common vocabulary and set of assessment items. They also may help encourage and enhance collaboration between instructional designers and DGBL game designers to create effective, enjoyable games for learning.

Teaching and learning mathematical functions and graphs pose significant challenges for teachers and students. Students often have difficulty in understanding a functional relationship between two quantities such as distance and time, temperature and precipitation, and gas price and number of gallons. Teaching students to have quantitative thinking about functions can help them understand the rate of change for complicated functions and later succeed in learning Calculus. Traditional educational methods such as static graph images and some learning tools usually have some limitations. Teaching students the dynamic changes of quantities within the static picture has serious difficulties. Compared to the learning tools, the game-based learning increases interest when students are learning complicated functions. This thesis presents a game-based learning application called Functions Fun, which runs on iPad tablet computers. The game is created to teach / learn the following functions: Linear, Quadratic, Exponential, Logarithmic, Trigonometric, and Polynomial with degrees over four. Each function is covered under a game level. The game setting is a jungle environment. Each game level has its own scene, challenging the player to take an action while teaching a function and its graphical representation. Functions Fun enables students to play and learn functions and graphs in a more effective and entertaining manner. / Master of Science / Teaching functions and graphs plays an important role in mathematics education. Teachers and researchers emphasize the need for students to form the quantitative thinking habits when they are learning different function graphs. This thesis presents Functions Fun, an iPad educational game that aims to help secondary students to understand function graphs by varying two quantities x and y such as distance and time, temperature and precipitation, and gas price and number of gallons. Adventure game is chosen as the game genre and six real-life models related to the following six functions are created: Linear, Quadratic, Exponential, Logarithmic, Trigonometric, and Polynomial with degrees over four. Each function is covered under a game level. The game setting is a jungle environment. Players are rewarded for their accomplishments. Through game effects and animations, students can have a better understanding of how the value changes of variables x and y influence the shape of graphs.

Nowadays cross platform software development is more expensive than ever before in terms of time and effort. Meantime with increasing number of personal devices, it is harder for local applications to synchronize and connect to the Internet. In terms of educational games, they can be divided into "local educational game" and "web educational game." "Local game" indicates the ones either on tablets, mobile devices or PC, which is an application on the corresponding platform. This kind of game mostly does not have backend support nor cross platform features such as the iPad version of CandyFactory. For one specific game, if the developer wants it to run on iPad and Android tablets, they need to develop two applications based on corresponding development framework, which is time and effort consuming. "Web game" indicates the ones on websites, which support cross platforms, but do not have backend support. Usually they are pure JavaScript or flash games with no backend recording the performances and the achievements. Software development for each individual platform is time and effort consuming. In order to achieve cross platform development, many programming languages and platforms like Java, Python, and JVM appear. Among all the cross platform approaches, cloud-based software development is the most universal solution to this problem. With web browsers built into every operating system, cloud software can be compatible with almost any device. Moreover, "Software-as-a-Service" (SaaS) is becoming a new software engineering paradigm and cloud-based software development is more popular because of its flexible scalability and cross platform features. In this thesis, we create a cloud-based educational game, CandyFactory, based on an iPad version of CandyFactory, and add backend to it to record user performance as well as achievements. Firstly, we re-develop the whole game from the iOS platform to the cloud-based Java EE platform. Secondly, we add new features to improve the game play such as ruler functionality and achievements animation. Thirdly, we add backend support to CandyFactory, including user account creation, course creation and performance report generation. With this functionality, teachers can monitor their students' performances and generate course reports. Moreover, teachers can view a specific student's report in order to provide more specific and effective help to their students. Lastly, with the advantages of cloud-based software development, we can update the whole application at any time without forcing the user to reinstall the update or re-download the game. With the hot update, the cloud-based CandyFactory is highly maintainable. The cloud-based CandyFactory runs on any computer that supports minimum 1024x768 screen resolution. The computer could be iPads, Android or Microsoft tablets, Windows or Mac laptops and desktops, and any other computer with a web browser. The advantages of cloud-based educational games over local educational games and web educational games are: firstly, they have cross platform features; secondly, they have backend data collection support; thirdly, they are consistent even if users log in with different computers, their game record and history will always be the same; lastly, the teacher can always keep track of his/her students' performance and provide more specific help and feedback. / Master of Science / Providing services on the cloud has become universal. The term “Cloud-Based” indicates that the software application runs on a server computer and users access the application by using a web browser anywhere and anytime. This thesis presents a cloud-based educational game called CandyFactory to teach fractions. The users can use CandyFactory under a web browser on an Internet-connected tablet, laptop, or desktop computer with minimum 1024x768 screen resolution. User’s game performance data is recorded on the server computer regardless of which tablet, laptop, or desktop computer the user uses to play the game. Cloud-based CandyFactory has four kinds of users: Individual, Teacher, Student, Administrator. Individual users can play the game to learn fractions as well as generate performance reports. Teachers can create a course, automatically generate student accounts under a course, and generate performance reports for individual students or for the whole class. Students can play the game under the account provided by the teacher and view their performance reports. Administrator is a built-in account user for maintaining the cloud-based software application. By developing the cloud-based CandyFactory educational game, we provide the users a crossplatform and cross-computers solution which helps the teachers and students learn fractions more efficiently and effectively.

Education plays a pivotal role in shaping the future of any nation. Researchers, pedagogists, and teachers all over the world are constantly working towards improving the process of teaching at all levels of education in order to help impart knowledge in a more effective way. One of the most fundamental branches of education is mathematics. Unless a strong foundation is laid in childhood, it becomes difficult for adults to apply mathematics to their daily lives. Mathematics is such a field that it is integrated in most of our activities. Fractions, a mathematics topic, pose significant challenges for middle school students Although the students generally understand proper fractions (i.e., the numerator is smaller than the denominator), they find it very difficult to learn improper fractions (i.e., the numerator is greater than the denominator). One cannot do away with parts of mathematics curriculum, just because the concept is hard to grasp. The solution is to come up with alternative methods to teach these concepts, such that they are easier to understand and more fun to learn. This thesis describes a digital game-based solution for teaching fractions to middle school students using iOS mobile devices, i.e., iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch. We developed a universal iOS game, called Candy Factory, which runs on all iOS mobile devices. The game assigns the student the role of the owner of a Candy Factory and tasks the student to manufacture a candy bar to match the kind and size of a customer order from a whole candy bar that is retrieved from the warehouse. The game is created to teach fractions based on the concept of partitioning and iterating. The student performs various activities such as partitioning, iterating, and measuring to produce the candy bar to satisfy the customer requirements. The game consists of three levels, which help the student progress smoothly from easier problems to more difficult ones. The Candy Factory game, not only helps students learn the fundamentals of fractions, but also makes the learning process enjoyable. / Master of Science

This study examines how a game-based lesson plan can affect students' motivation for schoolwork and their understanding of historical timelines. The study was conducted in a grade five where some students were recorded, interviewed and observed. The result indicates that a game-based lesson plan can affect students' motivation both positively and negatively depending on how the game is designed, and factors that are not directly connected to the game, such as grouping. Factors such as repetition, image support and that the game and grouping enable students to be in the zone of proximal development can be supportive for students learning. The benefits with this game-based lesson plan are that the games are flexible and reusable and can be adapted in different ways. The negative aspects of this game-based lesson plan are that the economy of the school can control which functions the students can use, and an unsuccessful grouping can lead to bad collaboration and unmotivated students.