Duolingo is currently the best example of gamification in the educational sector. Moreover, it's FREE! Duolingo has broken apart the skills that make up over 32 different languages and placed them into an interactive knowledge tree, where completing one module earns you points and unlocks the next set of skills to practice. Experience points are a way of tracking how much you practice, while a special currency, called Lingots, are earned for exceptional work or by contributing useful information to the community discussion boards. Lingots can be traded in for unlockable skills, meta game items, and swag. These lessons can all be accessed via phone, tablet, or web based devices.
“Gamification is a business strategy which applies game design techniques to non-game contexts to drive user behavior.”
If you want to go the extra mile, Duolingo offers even more support and functionality on their web based platform.
- Teachers can sign up their students and track their progress with a native Dashboard.
- Teachers and Students alike can access discussion forums with tips, tricks, and advice on how to maximize the language learning experience.
- Moreover, all users have the ability to add, translate, and proof-read authentic materials in a section called "Immersion".
- This section allows users to upload materials such as books, webpages, and news articles in any language for translation practice and provides users with the ability to edit and give or receive feedback (make corrections) to the translated uploads.
- This system is complemented by a rating system, where users can "Upvote" or "Downvote" the corrections made by others, which can earn users Lingots as well.
- This section allows users to upload materials such as books, webpages, and news articles in any language for translation practice and provides users with the ability to edit and give or receive feedback (make corrections) to the translated uploads.