Game based learning (GBL) is a type of gameplay that has defined learning outcomes. Generally, game based learning is designed to balance subject matter with gameplay and the ability of the player to retain and apply said subject matter to the real world.
GBL Kinds:
  1. Digital Game-Based Learning: Digital game-based learning (DGBL) is an instructional method that incorporates educational content or learning principles into video games with the goal of engaging learners.
  2. Social Gaming: Commonly refers to playing online games that allow or require social interaction between players, as opposed to playing games in solitude.
GBL Impact:
  1. Games and play are a central part of childhood and can stimulate creativity and learning.
  2. Students learn faster and better with games.
  3. Game-based learning is the best for cognitive retention.
  4. Games based learning provides versatility for more than one learning style, and also can affect cognitive and psychomotor skills.
  5. Educational gaming can capture immediate, in-depth data about each student's performance that opens the door to entirely new modes of measuring progress and achievement, in ways that reward and reinforce engagement.
  6. There is less scope of any sort of cheats to be taking place.
  7. Assessment can be ongoing; Feedback can be frequent; Students can know where they stand day-by-day.
  8. Elements like rewards and awards for effort can motivate students to keep trying when they might otherwise give up.
  9. Educational video games can motivate children and allow them to develop an awareness of consequentiality.
  10. Children are allowed to express themselves as individuals while learning and engaging in social issues.
  11. With most teens playing games with others, at least, some of the time and can incorporate many aspects of civic and political life.
  12. In a successful game-based learning environment, choosing actions, experiencing consequences, and working toward goals allows players to make mistakes through experimentation in a risk-free environment.
  13. Most games also have problem-solving situations that spark creativity.
  14. Students that participate in educational video games can offer deeper, more meaningful insights in all academic areas.
Why GBL Works:
  1. Video game designers have been producing and refining highly motivating learning environments for their players to enjoy.
  2. Good game-based learning applications can draw us into virtual environments that look and feel familiar and relevant.
Comparison of Traditional Training, Hands-On, and Game-Based Learning:
Principles that Describe the GBL Process:
  1. Students’ prior knowledge can help or hinder learning.
  2. Students’ motivation determines, directs and sustains what they do to learn.
  3. To develop mastery, students must acquire component skills, practice integrating them, and know when to apply what they have learned.
  4. Goal-directed practice coupled with targeted feedback enhances the quality of students’ learning.
Learning Principles Well-designed Games Embody:
  1. Subset Principle: Learning, even at its start, takes place in a (simplified) subset of the real domain.
  2. Active, Critical Learning Principle: The learning environment must encourage active and critical, not passive, learning.
  3. Probing Principle: Learning is a cycle of probing the world (doing something); reflecting on this action and, on this basis, forming a hypothesis; re-probing the world to test the hypothesis; and then accepting or rethinking the hypothesis.
  4. Practice Principle: Learners get lots of practice in a context where the practice is not boring.
Genres for Game Play:
  1. Addimal Adventure: Challenges children to solve mathematical equations with a support of friendly characters.
  2. Zoo U: Helps grade school students navigate a series of challenging social situations.
  3. Reach for the Sun: Encourages deep understanding of photosynthesis as students grow a virtual sunflower from seed to full plant.
  4. Alternate Reality Game (ARG): An interactive networked narrative that uses the real world as a platform and uses transmedia storytelling to deliver a story that may be altered by players' ideas or actions.
  5. World of Warcraft: Give players the means to save worlds, and incentive to learn the habits of heroes.
Educational Games:
  1. Grub Run: A health and fitness game
  2. President of the Galaxy: A game about the dynamics of U.S. presidential elections
  3. Land Grab: A game highlighting a conceptual social behavioral model called the tragedy of the commons
  4. Kinems Kinect Learning Games: A game to empower children with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) learning disabilities
  5. God of War: A game that teaches about Greek mythology
  6. We the Jury: A game about legal cases
Resources to Implement GBL:
  1. Edmodo: https://spotlight.edmodo.com/product/based-learning-7-gbl-game-based-learning--385409/
  2. Edutopia: http://www.edutopia.org/game-based-learning-resources
  3. Edweb: edweb.net/gaming
  4. Classcraft: https://spotlight.edmodo.com/product/class-craft--385405/
  5. 7 Good Examples of Gamification in Education:https://spotlight.edmodo.com/product/7-good-examples-of-gamification-in-education--385407/
  6. Classroom Games for Students’ Memory:https://spotlight.edmodo.com/product/classroom-games-for-students-memory--383747/
  7. English Language Arts Games and Activities:https://spotlight.edmodo.com/product/english-language-arts-games-and-activities--383909/
  8. ESL Review Games: https://spotlight.edmodo.com/product/esl-review-games--384533/
  9. 37 Activities and Games that need no Props:https://spotlight.edmodo.com/product/37-activities-and-games-that-need-no-props--384725/
  10. Real Projects: http://www.realprojects.co.uk/gamebasedlearning/