Gamifying a course, phase 2: Onboarding

To continue from the previous post, phase 1 ....

My first step was to create a new course plan:

Now I have due dates ... which helps me organize... which helps me plan.

My next step was to review and streamline tasks, beginning with Onboarding.

Well...yes and no...   I had to multi-task, actually.   While streamlining the Onboarding tasks, I realized I needed to develop my narrative for the course...so I streamlined...then pondered my narrative, then streamlined, then threw out the narrative, then streamlined some more, then re-wrote the narrative....

Whew.... and decided to frame the entire experience from the position of each student being invited to serve as a Visiting Staff Member of the fictional Mountain View Community College.  While serving in this position, their goal was to learn as much as possible about the various units to better prepare them for an interview in May. They would be introduced by a variety of campus tour guides who would take them to the various units, proving overviews, content, even introducing them to "students."

I discovered I had to become both linear and nonlinear during this stage of creating...keeping both the big and small picture in my mind at all times.  What an exercise for me!

Trying to approach this from the perspective of being a new hire, albeit temporary, it occurred to me I needed to, once again, re-frame the experience.

Students entering the course were greeted by a Voki who provided an overview and introduction to the course.

But what else do then need to get started and not be overwhelmed and confused?

Thinking like HR, I considered most community colleges offer some sort of social for new employees, so why not Mountain View Community College? I crafted the following text for the course home page:

 So... I have set the scene...

What is the first thing that everyone does at a college-wide social?

We check in!

So will my students.  When they click on the check-in table a flip book will appear:

 What happens after we check in?   We attend the Staff  Social where we meet our new colleagues!

Clicking on this graphic takes students to the Staff Social Module in Canvas where they will participate in a forum to meet each other and have their first opportunity to earn a badge. The student view of the Staff Social is as follows:

 I want to make sure everyone attends the Staff Social and "socializes," so I am requiring students to complete all items and earn at least a score of 95 on the forum to earn their first badge.

Here is where I started re-learning Canvas.  I say "re-learn" because I considered myself extremely knowledgeable about Canvas, but gamifying a course has taken that knowledge to a whole new level.  (Wait until we get to Mastery Paths in a future blog post!)

I needed to edit my module settings to make each module item required and to set a minimum score. In the Canvas instructor view, each module has a little gear icon to the right with a drop down window In that drop down menu, I clicked on Edit and create these rules to edit my module settings.  Notice that I selected a minimum grade required and that students view a particular page. Clicking on Update Module saved this new setting, and this module is required!

Now...to add a badge.....  Gamification includes rewards, after all....

Badgr provides a lot of great resource videos to guide us through the badge creation and award process. After setting up an account in Badgr, viewing their videos,  and integrating Badgr into Canvas, I was finally able to set up the logic for automatic badge award!

Now students will automatically receive their Social Butterfly Badge once they have "attended" and completed their Staff Social Module.

Me, as a Voki

Completing this module is key as it unlocks the next component.

What comes after the Staff Social? They meet their first Tour Guide, me!

I then take them to meet James who will escort them to HR for their Mountain. View Community College Orientation. Just as in a typical work orientation, they review policies and procedures (Course Overview), they complete the requisite HR paperwork (in this case the pre-assessment mentioned in the previous blog post), and they schedule a meeting with their supervisor (Virtual Coffee Break with me).

James

Next they complete a knowledge capture - what they currently ow regarding faculty and staff  to be used later in a course project.  They watch  several videos (History of Community Colleges and Issues Impacting Community Colleges), discuss these with one another (discussion forums), and read a few chapters in their text.

James then returns to escort them to meet their next tour guide at the Student Lounge.

Completing the Orientation is pivotal, as other modules ("stops" along their tour) will not unlock until the Orientation is complete..  While part of the reason is to force students into completing all tasks to help prepare them for success in this course, the other reason is to allow me to individualize their journey through this course based on their pre-assessment scores.  I need to give myself time to score the pre-assessment and identify a mastery path for each student. This means I need to schedule the pre-assessment as early as possible to allow me the time I need to do my part.

Originally the orientation module included a lot of other tasks, such as creating a blog, Twitter account, instagram account,and so forth, but in streamlining I decided to omit some of those tasks, and others will be worked in as part of task options later.

Now...on to the next two stops:  Student Lounge and Faculty Lounge  Content in part 3.