The game constitutes an excellent educational device: the playful experience is not only highly pleasant, but also allows for knowledge, creativity and the social construction of the person.
Currently, with the incursion of gaming behavior into virtuality and the appearance of a diversity of previously unsuspected game modalities, we need to rethink the theorization and research on it, discard the idea that only children play and that this is a behavior that, while being so satisfying for the player, only serves to “waste time.”
“Online games” have a series of characteristics that make them good candidates to complement the teaching and learning process: they are motivating, they engage the activity and interest of students, they awaken imagination and innovation to solve problems.
The effect of gamification or serious games on learning, according to the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER), confirms that:
Video games have a positive effect on problem-solving skills and knowledge acquisition.
Most studies that examine the impact of video games on student motivation and engagement find positive results.
The few studies that analyze whether video games affect attitudes towards learning find a positive relationship.