Document Type : Original Research Paper

Authors

• M. Ghasemi arganeh ¹
• S. Pourroostaei Ardakani ²
• A. Mohseni Ezhiyeh ³
• R. Fathabadi ⁴

¹ Department of Psychology and education of Exceptional Children, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University Tehran, Tehran, Iran

² Department of Instructional Technology, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Allameh Tabataba'i University, Tehran, Iran

³ Department of Psychology and education of Exceptional Children, Department of Educational Sciences, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran

⁴ Department of Psychology and education of Exceptional Children, Department of Educational Sciences, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Allameh Tabataba'i University, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Background and Objectives: Pillars of civilization of any society is based on the system and structure of education; and without any doubt health, comprehensiveness and efficiency of the education system of that society depends on the scope, breadth, diversity and quality of comprehensive educational programs and educational services that are offered to students in regular schools or special classes. We have often seen students who are very similar in terms of learning ability and talent; but there are many differences in their academic achievement. We see these differences not only in school learning but also in other non-academic activities. This aspect of human behavior is related to the field of motivation. Psychologists often see motivation as a process that is involved in motivating, directing, and sustaining behavior. Motivation is the basis of human behavior and the most important factor of various behaviors and in fact the driving force of human activities and their directing factor. Gamification is currently one of the techniques that can increase motivation. Gamification is a new method that has been translated as ‘playmaking’ in some sources and means the use of playful elements and thoughts in areas that are not the nature of the game. Gamification has been one of the topics discussed in recent years, which can be used to increase efficiency and user interaction. Properly applied gamification in educational environments will lead to better learning of users. This study investigates the impact of gamification on educational motivation for mentally disabled students.
Methods: This research utilizes a quasi-experiment research method through which pre andpost-tests are organized for two groups of students, i.e., control and experimental. The reserach population covers all mentally challenged students in Kermanshah Providence in Iran. The experiment sample consists of 32 students selected using a convenience sampling method. They randomly formed two groups of 16 as control and experimental. The experimental group was taught by game-based instructions, whereas the control received ordinary lessons in the classroom. For this, a 20 sessions (ordinary and game-based) course were designed for both groups of students. Harter motivation test was used in this research to collect data from the students. The collected data was analyzed using a one-way analysis of covariance.
Findings: In the descriptive statistics section, the studied variables were analyzed using statistical index tables, mean and standard deviation; and in the inferential statistics section, the research hypotheses were analyzed using analysis of covariance. According to the results, game-based education has a positive impact on educational motivation for mentally disabled students and the effect size of the Eta squared in research is 0.49 on the internal motivation and 0.51 is the external motive.
Conclusions: According to the findings of the analysis of covariance, gamification-based teaching methods have a positive effect on internal and external academic motivation (p <0.01). It is concluded that motivation plays a key role in learning, specifically if the students with mental disabilities join game-based educational environments.

Keywords

• gamification
• educational motivation
• Mentally disabled students
• Game-Based Education

20.1001.1.20080441.1400.15.3.2.1

Main Subjects

• Educational Technology

COPYRIGHTS 
©2021 The author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, as long as the original authors and source are cited. No permission is required from the authors or the publishers.