Digital Game based Learning for Undergraduate Calculus Education: Immersion, Calculation, and Conceptual Understanding

This study has two goals: First, to investigate the effectiveness of using a digital game to teach undergraduate-level calculus in terms of improving task immersion, sense of control, calculation skills, and conceptual understanding. Second, to investigate how feedback and visual manipulation can facilitate conceptual understanding of calculus. 132 undergraduate students participated in a controlled lab experiment and were randomly assigned to either a game-playing condition, a practice quiz condition, or a no-treatment control condition. The authors collected survey data and behavioral-tracking data recorded by the server during gameplay. The results showed that students who played the digital game reported highest task immersion but not sense of control. Students in the game condition also performed significantly better in conceptual understanding compared to students who solved a practice quiz and the control group. Gameplay behavioral-tracking data was used to examine the effects of visual manipulation and feedback on conceptual understanding.