Xinyu Gu

ENGL 693A

04/24/22

Gamifying ESL Classroom Learning

Introduction of the Project

With the rapid development and advancement of tons of technology devices, everyone’s

life is closely surrounded by technology and digital media. As mentioned in Lotherington &

Jenson (2011)’s writing, “...the concept of optional extrication from the digital world is not

realistic, yet language and literacy instruction continue to resist digitalized multimedia and

multimodal literacy practices as optional or secondary to flat textual practices” (p. 239). Even

though most language learning classrooms nowadays still take place in the traditional classrooms

with the basic paper and pen format, it is essential to realize and value the potential of learning

through technology and digital gaming and possible ways of incorporating immersive and

engaging learning activities into language learning.

When it comes to games, many people hold negative opinions towards them and view

games as things that will distract children and hinder their learning process. However, learning

through multimodal materials, including game-based learning, can encourage students to make

connections between their world and the world of the text/content and to think at a metalevel

(Clarice & Maya, 2019, p. 91). With proper guidance, game-based learning can help students get

immersed in the learning process and see and understand the information from an insider

perspective rather than learning from an outsider's third-person point of view. In addition to the

immersive learning environment, game-based learning also offers many other benefits like player

collaboration, interactions involving negotiation and languaging, and the development of various
competencies and literacies (Reinhardt, 2017, p.207). Compared to a traditional classroom where

students learn through lectures, practices, and tests, game-based learning provides a low stake

immersion experience where students get to practice using and learning new English language

skills in real-world contexts and conversation. The collaborative aspect that games contain is also

a great way to promote communication among students, which is something that many English

language learners struggle with.

This project aims to share an example of how a technology involving game-based

English language learning activity designed by using the app called Twine can be incorporated

into an English language learning classroom and promote language development for students in

this classroom.

Description of the Twine Activity

The plot of this project is a detective story that takes place in Taipei, Taiwan. Students

will be the detective of this story, work with their classmates to solve the case, and find out who

is the real thief by making choices based on the information they received from different stages

of the story and different characters within the story.

Background Information on Student Population

This project will take place in an English classroom with about 10~15 Chinese high

school students in an English academy, and the length of the lesson will be 45 minutes per lesson

and two lessons per week. The entire project will take about a month (6 lessons) to complete. My

targeted student group is high school students in my hometown, Zhoushan city, Zhejiang

Province, China. This student group’s English Proficiency level is about the intermediate level to
the high-intermediate level. I decided on this targeted student group and the setting because I had

some teaching experiences with high school students in my hometown during my volunteer

experiences before. Also, I plan to go back to teaching after I graduate, so I think this group of

students and the setting are appropriate.

This project aims to help students combine what they have learned in class and enhance

their four English skills (reading, writing, speaking, listening) in a real-world context. Especially

for the speaking and listening skills, which most Chinese EFL learners lack practice, will be

enhanced during the project. Also, students’ critical thinking skills will be promoted in this

project.

Learning Objectives/Outcomes

● Students will be able to learn vocabulary associated with locations and jobs and know the

correct phonemes for these vocabulary words.

● Students will be able to use the correct tenses and sentence structures when discussing

this project with their classmates and practice strategies like turn-taking and repetition to

enhance their English speaking and listening skills.

● Students will be able to use their prior knowledge to have a collaborative discussion with

others on their thoughts and findings in different project stages.

● Students will be able to comprehensively and accurately use their reading and writing

skills to present their understanding of the project.

● Students will be able to use the knowledge they have learned in class in this project with

understanding.
 ● Students will be able to gain a positive attitude toward their English-speaking skills and

become more comfortable speaking up.

Implementation of the Project

Prior to the start of this project, students will first use one week (one class period) to learn

about possible vocabulary words and sentence structures they will be using in this project. (For

example, the past tense students must use for discussing suspects’ timelines with their classmates

and certain words they might not be very familiar with, like “miniature”, “investigation”,

“script”, etc.) The vocabulary and grammatical features will be reminded and practiced from

time to time during the game process.

Below is the rough lesson plan for lesson two that incorporated the project into the

teaching/learning process. Complete lesson plans can be found in the Lesson Plan document.

Lesson Two

Ten minutes – the class will start by asking students to share what kind of detective they think

they are in this story (associate with Homework from the last class).

Fifteen minutes – students will work together to continue working on the game (finish the

Miniature Museum of Taiwan investigation part).

● Google VR Tour scene two (or the related image) will be accessed.

Five minutes – make sure students are all on the same page (finish the Miniature Museum of

Taiwan investigation part) and bring the entire class back.

Ten minutes – The teacher explains the next part of the game, which is the first round of

interviews with suspects to students. Explain what the role-playing activity will look like and ask

students to volunteer to pick which role they want to role-play next semester.
 ● Rule of this activity: one person from each group will need to volunteer to do the

role-play, while the other person from the group needs to write essential information that

he/she thinks is important down during the role play

● *** All the interviews after this round will have audio recordings for students to listen to

as a way to practice their listening comprehension skills ***

Five minutes – short Q&A section for any questions students have on this game. Homework will

also be announced during this time.

Homework due before next class: Writing task#2 on Google VR Tour scene two and prepare

for the role-playing activity

Challenges and Next Steps

Even though this project is flexible and can be modified based on students’ English level

and familiarity with technologies and digital apps, depending on the students’ situation, it might

require teachers to put in a lot of explanation and scaffoldings prior to bringing the project itself

into the lessons. Thus, it might be hard to fit the project into an already established class

schedule, especially when some specific rules or goals need to be followed and met at certain

times.

This project is very tech-heavy, which can be problematic in some ways. For example,

some of the digital tools designed in this project are based on Google, which is inaccessible to

students in China. Also, the Google Tour App initially being incorporated in this project is no

longer working. So, if teachers would like to bring this project into their classrooms, it might

require them to do some modifications and find alternative ways to provide hints and associated

tasks to students in an accessible and approachable way.

References

Clarice M Moran, & Maya K Woodall. (2019). "It was like I was there": Inspiring engagement

through virtual reality. English Journal, 109(1), 90-96.

Lotherington, H., & Jenson, J. (2011). Teaching multimodal and digital literacy in L2 settings:

New literacies, new basics, new pedagogies. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics,

31(Mar), 226-246.

Reinhardt, J. (2017). Digital gaming in L2 teaching and learning. In The Handbook of

Technology and Second Language Teaching and Learning (pp. 202- 216). Hoboken,

NJ, USA: John Wiley & Sons.