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A Critical Examination of Feedback in Early Reading Games

Published: 21 April 2018 Publication History

Abstract

Learning games now play a role in both formal and informal learning, including foundational skills such as literacy. While feedback is recognised as a key pedagogical dimension of these games, particularly in early learning, there has been no research on how commercial games available to schools and parents reify learning theory into feedback. Using a systematic content analysis, we examine how evidence-based feedback principles manifest in five widely-used learning games designed to foster young children's reading skills. Our findings highlight strengths in how games deliver feedback when players succeed. Many of the games, however, were inconsistent and not proactive when providing error feedback, often promoting trial and error strategies. Furthermore, there was a lack of support for learning the game mechanics and a preference for task-oriented rewards less deeply embedded in the gameplay. Our research provides a design and research agenda for the inclusion of feedback in early learning games.

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      cover image ACM Conferences
      CHI '18: Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
      April 2018
      8489 pages
      ISBN:9781450356206
      DOI:10.1145/3173574
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      Published: 21 April 2018

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      Author Tags

      1. children
      2. feedback
      3. learning games
      4. reading

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      CHI '18 Paper Acceptance Rate 666 of 2,590 submissions, 26%;
      Overall Acceptance Rate 6,199 of 26,314 submissions, 24%

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