Reading 4

My Reading and research

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Hi folks so for the past few weeks due to other assignments being piled on I have been having problems not only catching up on the workload for this but also understanding what it is I am suppose to be reading up on and where to look for these.

Through discussing this with my lecturer in person I have figured out a plan for what I need to do in order to progress on this topic.

Researching my choices 

In order for me to progress I needed to start researching my topic. for this I had to research my chosen topic (Serious games) in order to do this  and then to add the sources to the matrix set up by my lecturer with the following information. 

• Sources
• Study Parameters
• Thesis
• Primary Sources
• Research Question/topic
• Conclusions
• Limitations ,gaps, and weaknesses
• Strengths
• Significance

Unfortunately I still find many of these questions confusing even after it being explained as I am confused on what to place on particular ones which resulted in me getting only 2 done , as I am not sure If I have even done these correctly. However I do plan on working on them both tomorrow and during the weekend in order to fill out the excel sheet requirements requirements for my research.  I do also plan tonight to simplify the following bits of information's titles by looking up the meanings for each to help simplify them. as seen below.

Main List Overview

•  Name of the Authors
•  year published
• Title
• City Published
• Publisher
• Pages used

(Note: Citations are listed alphabetically order to the authors last name)

I found this information from a site I found on google describing how to do Harvard referencing titled " Ultimate Guide to Harvard Referencing". Link can be found here

Meanings for my Excel Requirements

Sources: These can take many forms such as from Publications, to books to popular sources such as news and magazines. When googled the following description for a source is as follows." A place , person, or thing from which something originates or  Can be obtained ".

Study Parameters: Study parameters when associated with Harvard referencing refers to the date/ year in which the article/publication was published.

Thesis: A thesis is a statement/ theory that is put forward as a premise to be proved or maintained

Primary Sources: A Primary Source consists of items such as archives/manuscripts, audio recordings, video recordings, films, journals, letters and even diaries.

Research Question/Topic:  A research question is basically what guides your research paper, project or thesis and essentially gives your work a clear focus by pinpointing exactly what you need to find.

Conclusions: Conclusions are the end or finish of a event , text or process.

Limitations, gaps weaknesses: Allows the the person doing the referencing to discuss the pros an cons of the item being referenced.

Strengths: What makes the piece stand out from other pieces( Its Pros)(Things that are described well)

Significance: What makes the piece significant/(worthy of attention/importance)

Programs Used to Find Sources

The Main two sources I am using when looking for Sources is Google Scholar, as well as using the sources provided by the library on the Tu Dublin Blachardstown Campus.

I ended up using the library sources as my research ,as it provided me with the following titles to research on in the coming week.

1. Why and How Serious Games can Become Far More Effective
2. Serious Games and Innovative Technologies in Medical Education In Bulgaria
3. Role Model Features in Educational Serious Games
4. Looking In, Performing Worlds: Outer Space as a Me
5. Scenario-based Serious Game to Teach about Healthcare
6. Serious Game Design for Terengganu Brass ware Craft
7. Serious Game, Gamified Applications, Educational System
8. Serious Games for Children: A Systematic Literature
9. Serious Games for Training Social Skills in Job In
10. The adoption of a serious game to foster interacting
11. Use of a Serious Game for Teaching Operations Progress
12. We Make Games. Using Serious Game Design Concepts 
13. What could the baseline measurements predict about
14. Game Learning Analytics, Facilitating the Use of S
15. A Gamification Approach for Serious Games
16. Designing an Io T-focused, Multiplayer Serious Game
17. Enter the Serious E-scape Room: A Cost-Effective S
18. Evaluating Level Ed AR: An Indoor Modelling Application
19. GIMME: Group Interactions Manager for Multiplayer 
20. Learning through improvisational play: design strategy

I did however run into an issue in doing this as I saved them on my google doc to be able to read through them easier and unfortunately only 2 of 20 are readable so i must attempt to find each of the titles in the coming days in order to complete them on the matrix which can be seen in the image below.

A screenshot of my progression of the excel on the mac 

From this piece of research I managed to write up on two of the 20 required

1. "Serious Games and Innovative Technologies in Medical Education in Bulgaria": I found this Piece quite informative as it shows the problems faced by teachers in the process of training the students within today's technological society which resulted in a conclusion of 94.9%  showing Significant interest in the introduction of serious games in training. It also highlighted the preferred tool for these learning games being the phone, followed by the educational boar and then other tools.This survey was done within a group of over 156 students from its first to fourth year course which may have proved biased as the opinions between years could have differed greatly due to the workload differences. Another con is that it is from only the country of Bulgaria which can make it subjective/ biased or it could make it a piece of significance as there is possibly not as many items available on this topic.
2. "Why and How Serious Games can Become Far More Effective: Accommodating  Productive learning Experiences, Learner Motivation and the monitoring of learning Gains":The aim of this paper was to improve the design methods for serious games by in identifying and highlighting common misconceptions and providing a timeline in order to avoid them. These included 

• The presumed conflict between learning and play 
• Learning from experience as the basis of game based learning
• Issues with experience based learning
• Neglecting the ineffectiveness of minimal guidance approaches
• Issues with motivation (Determinants of motivation, Style elements, Gameplay Scenarios, Reward Systems, Extrinsive causes for intrinsic motivation
• Issues with progress monitoring (Assessment as by product,  complexity of covert, dynamic assessment, Performance over learning process.

What I found most interesting about this piece was its conclusion as it highlighted how the learning and aspects in a serious game seem to be neglected in favor of the gaming part in ways such as the quality of acoustics and narrative. I agreed with this part alot as I do feel these parts get neglected a lot more which is surprising to me as with the way gaming has become in genres and diversity. you would think there would be more on this themes spectrum.

Conclusion

From my reading of these two pieces i feel more informed on my theme topic of "serious games" both from the aspect of what is lacing from the serious game industry to the interest in implementing serious games into a type of training from the percentage taken from the page on the study made in Bulgaria.