Enhancing Creative Thinking Through Gamification in LMS Environments

De Bono considers creativity to be a skill which can be improved with practice [5]. Its successful implementation requires both divergent thinking (“lateral thinking”) and convergent thinking (“vertical thinking”), as ideas should first be generated before they are judged, assessed or evaluated [4]. Creativity is useful in situations where an out-of-the-box solution to a problem is required or when a difficult decision needs to be made. It is considered to be a key 21st century skill [18, 15, 19, 10]. Davies discussed creativity as one of WHO’s five basic life skills as he states that “they (life skills) are also attractive to employers, who need workers that are mentally stable and well equipped to handle challenges and responsibilities that aren’t listed on the job description” [3]. The inclusion of a test for creative thinking in the 2022 Programme for International Assessment (PISA) highlights the importance of preparing students for future challenges [10]. There is no consensus on one definition of creativity. However, originality is one key element. Guilford, one of the founders of creativity research, defined creativity as the ability to produce ideas that are both novel and useful, emphasizing divergent thinking as central to the creative process [11]. Creativity was characterized by traits such as flexibility, originality, fluency, and elaboration; and Guilford highlighted its importance in education, industry, and problem-solving [11]. More recently, Goodman and Dingli defined creativity as a process that involves the generation of novel and valuable ideas, emphasizing its role in fostering innovation. In their view, creativity is a dynamic skill for adapting to rapidly changing environments, particularly in the context of personal and organizational success [9].

Deterding et al. had defined gamification as “the use of game design elements in non-game contexts” (p.1) [6]. A more complex definition was proposed in [12] and [13]. Huotari and Hamari define gamification as “a process of enhancing a service with affordances for gameful experiences in order to support users’ overall value creation” (p.19; p.25). In their view, “gamification could be understood more broadly as a process in which the ‘gamifier’ is attempting to increase the likelihood of the emergence of gameful experiences by imbuing the service with affordances” (i.e., “any qualities of the service system that contributes to the emergence of gameful experience”) ([13], p.25). Huotari and Hamari claim that “The core service of the game is to provide hedonic, challenging and suspenseful experiences for the player(s) or gameful experiences” (p.19) [12].

Creativity in gamification refers to the innovative and imaginative application of game design elements and principles to enhance learning and engagement. It involves not only the development of game mechanics and dynamics but also the ability to think outside traditional boundaries to create meaningful, engaging, and enjoyable experiences. Research has demonstrated that creativity and gamification motivate students to become more engaged in tasks that may otherwise be considered tedious and shift students’ attention from a bored and passive mode of engagement to a more active one ([14], [25]). The integration of gamification techniques, such as points and rewards systems (e.g., leaderboards, badges, etc.) into the learning process motivates students and creates a more engaging learning environment.

Implementing creativity methods, techniques, and tools in the gamification process for educational games may significantly enhance engagement and learning ([1]). Some methods for this to be effectively implemented include the incorporation of creative thinking frameworks, such as de Bono’s Lateral Thinking methods ([4]), or SCAMPER [7], where students are encouraged to Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify, Put to another use, Eliminate, and Reverse elements related to existing concepts, issues or problems. Role-playing activities and simulations encourage students to think creatively and critically. Risk-taking should be supported, and an environment where students feel comfortable experimenting and sharing their out-of-the-box ideas should be encouraged. The integration of various creativity tools into the gamification process makes it possible to create a dynamic educational experience that challenges, motivates, and engages students, enabling the enhancement of their creative thinking skills, and cultivating the development of essential 21st century skills [19].

Within the course area, users can create as many lessons as needed. Each lesson serves as a container for content that can be built by combining various types of elements. Lessons support the creation of a structured narrative, allowing the integration of text, images, external links, and embedded questions (see Figure 1).

Two types of questions, multiple-choice and short answer, can be inserted directly into the lessons. Both question types can be configured for automatic evaluation, enabling immediate feedback and facilitating formative assessment.

An example of a multiple-choice question created within a lesson is shown in Figure 2.

However, the types of questions available are limited, and the editing features come with certain constraints. For example, it is not possible to include images in multiple-choice questions within lessons, something that is allowed in the Online Tests tool. To address these limitations, it is possible to insert direct links to online tests from within a lesson, offering a way to expand the range of question types and formatting options.

When a student answers a question incorrectly, the system can provide explanatory feedback, along with links to relevant texts, websites, or videos. This helps students strengthen their understanding of the topic and better prepare for subsequent questions. Buttons can also be inserted within lessons to link to other sections, questions or resources. To each question can be assigned a specific number of points, and all scores are automatically recorded in the gradebook, streamlining the assessment process.

The Wiki tool in Sakai serves as a collaborative platform where users can create and edit interlinked web pages within the course environment. It is designed to support group collaboration, knowledge construction, and project-based learning. Each participant can contribute content, make revisions, and build upon the work of others, making it an ideal tool for encouraging peer interaction and cooperative learning.

Instructors and students can use the Wiki to document processes, share research, develop group reports, or co-create study materials. The tool maintains a complete version history, allowing for transparency in contributions and enabling the instructor to monitor individual involvement.

The Wiki tool can be effectively leveraged for team-based challenges or collaborative writing activities. For example, students may be tasked with completing sections of a document or working together to solve problems and share content or data. This collaborative approach promotes engagement, strengthens teamwork and soft skills, and reinforces course content through active participation.

To implement online tests in Sakai, a pool of questions must be created first. Each test then draws its questions from a selected pool, allowing for question reuse and structured assessment design.

Typically, the student receives a set of questions and is required to answer them sequentially, with no possibility of returning to previous questions. In this mode, feedback is only provided after the complete submission of the test. Alternatively, feedback can be shown immediately after each question, potentially revealing the correct answer; however, in such cases, the student is still allowed to change their response, which may not be suitable for high-stakes evaluations.

The order of questions can be either randomized; to discourage sharing and ensure uniqueness; or predefined if a progressive difficulty strategy is preferred. Each question is created using a rich-text editor, allowing for the inclusion of formatted text, images, hyperlinks, and other multimedia elements.

Questions can be designed to award points for correct answers, and the time taken to complete them can also be factored into performance evaluation.

Tests offer a wider variety of question types, such as calculated questions, file upload, fill-in-the-blank, hot spot, matching, multiple choice, numeric response, short answer, and true/false. Various types of multiple-choice questions are supported, and feedback can be provided at the individual option level, as well as at the end of the question.

The menu to insert a new question is shown in Figure 3.

Tests must be configured with specific start dates, times, and duration limits. For enhanced security, the LockDown Browser can be enabled, preventing access to external websites or applications during the test. All responses and grades are automatically linked to the Gradebook, and instructors can customize navigation rules and post-submission messages to guide or motivate students.

Our gamification experiences involve the following steps:

1. 1.

   Create a narrative to be used in all games. In that way the students can recall easily the context from one game to another and keep the focus on the proposed challenges.

2. 2.

   Select the appropriate tool to develop the game considering the topics and the learning outcomes. In case of the Sakai system the games can be implemented using three different tools: lessons, wiki and online tests.

3. 3.

   Depending on the tool chosen, organize the activities, define the instructions to be given to the player, select exercises about the topic, select the question types to be used, include them into the game script, adjust the dynamics (game flow), prepare the feedback, help links and motivational messages. The idea is to implement each gamification element using the available resources (see Table 1).

4. 4.

   In case of programming language exercises, a wide variety of tasks can be proposed to be performed: guessing the output of a program or a set of instructions, completing programs, detecting syntax errors, identifying equivalent instructions, understanding the semantics of instructions, giving examples of program interaction with the user, ordering the instructions of a program, reducing the number of lines of code to maintain functionalities, analyzing the change in variable values, analyzing possible change or optimization of instructions, understand the execution of the program (notably regarding the number of iterations) and given an output indicate which instruction produces it.

5. 5.

   Creatively integrate badges and penalties into the game flow: incorporate optional extra challenges; vary the points awarded for each completed task, and connect to the gradebook; display rankings to encourage healthy competition; assign badges at the end of each level, and offer rewards such as bonus points to recognize outstanding performance and sustain engagement.

When designing a gamified experience, it is needed to identify how each gamification element can be implemented using the available resources. The mapping exercise done at IPB is detailed in Table 1.

An action-adventure game was designed using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to generate a set of characters and environment images. Players assume the role of a Code-Warrior who must conquer the Digital Valhalla (DiVa) Palace located in a cyber cloud. A Code-Warrior must battle Loki and conquer the DiVa Palace by gaining programming skills. The player, Code-Warrior, will receive hints and feedback from benevolent gods, Odin, Thor, and Baldur, and friendly goddesses Saga and Freya. These goddesses will assist the Code-Warriors in entering battle games by overcoming various challenges and defeating Loki’s cheating tricks along the way. Odin, Baldur and Thor are responsible for providing the necessary help, clues and feedback throughout the game. The goddesses Saga and Freya guide the player through the various stages and award points and encourage them to continue to the end. Challenges overcome are recognized both by awarding points and by granting access to subsequent stages, providing intrinsic satisfaction to the learning process.

Before creating the lesson content, the first step involves defining a set of challenges. These challenges are based on small C language programs and include a wide variety of task types, as was stated in 4.1. The second step is to define the flow of the game-like experience. This includes ordering the challenges logically, assigning points for each correct answer, and implementing branching paths based on the results of previous questions (game flow). Personalized feedback should be designed for each possible answer, incorporating motivational messages, hints, links to supporting resources, and guidance to the next task. Additionally, final messages and rewards should be prepared for students who successfully complete the full set of challenges.

The third step involves building the lesson in the LMS, inserting elements one by one based on the previously defined structure. Unlike online tests, where questions can be randomly selected from a pool, the Lessons tool supports a sequential and adaptive challenge structure. Different narrative paths can be created depending on the student’s responses.

Text and images can be used between questions to provide context or guidance. For each question, instructors can configure point values, feedback, disable resubmission, enable automatic grading, and link results directly to the Gradebook. Buttons are used for navigation between sections, and color-coded buttons can differentiate between normal progress and recovery paths. This allows for the implementation of personalized learning paths within the same lesson.

To enhance immersion, Valhalla characters are integrated into the narrative to guide students through the experience. As illustrated in Figure 2, navigation buttons can be embedded via subpages, allowing students to move forward based on their choices and performance.

Feedback can be provided either per answer choice or per question, offering corrections, explanations, and guidance. All activities are connected to the Gradebook, which automatically collects scores and enables the creation of a final leaderboard or ranking.

Creativity techniques can also enhance the design of game mechanics. For instance, in one of the games developed for the Imperative Programming course, students are presented with a single C program accompanied by five encrypted questions. To access the questions, they must first implement a decryption function. Once decrypted, the goal is to answer all questions as quickly as possible. To introduce time-based challenges within lessons, a final task can be included that requires students to upload a file, which is then timestamped to assess completion speed.

The Wiki tool in Sakai is a powerful feature for implementing collaborative work and fostering team-based learning. Within the gamified experience developed for the Imperative Programming course, a dedicated wiki page was created for each group of students. These pages included: a description of the activity, a set of function prototypes and a pre-defined main() function. To facilitate collaboration, the instructor organized the class into groups and identified a group leader for each team. The group leader received special instructions and was responsible for assigning roles to team members. Each student was tasked with developing specific functions, contributing directly to the shared wiki page.

The group leader played a central role, overseeing the team’s progress and ensuring that all functions were correctly implemented and integrated into the final solution. Additionally, the leader could evaluate each team member’s contribution, post program outputs as comments on the page, and guide the overall coordination of the task.

All student contributions remain visible on the wiki page, providing a transparent record of collaboration. This allows for manual evaluation by both the group leader and the instructor, based on the content developed and the team dynamics observed during the activity. The benefits of this approach are:

• $\mathrm{■}$

  Students can edit code directly within the wiki page, making it suitable for collaborative programming tasks.

• $\mathrm{■}$

  The comment feature can be leveraged for communication between team members and with the instructor.

• $\mathrm{■}$

  Although automatic evaluation is not available in the wiki tool, outcomes can be validated by having leaders or teachers upload results or insert reflective comments.

This format promotes not only coding skills but also critical soft skills such as communication, task delegation, peer evaluation, and project coordination, which are essential in professional software development environments.

An example of a collaborative wiki activity setup is shown in Figure 4.

There are several key differences between Lessons and Tests in Sakai, especially when used in a gamified environment. Tests offer a wider variety of question types, as previously mentioned. But it is also essential to note that not all question types support automatic evaluation, so instructors should choose compatible question types for the gamified experience. Additionally, it is possible to randomize questions in Tests, which isn’t an option in Lessons. Multiple submissions are allowed in Tests if feedback is provided at the end, but for gamified activities, multiple submissions should be restricted to maintain the integrity of the game. Time limits can be set for Tests, which is ideal for creating time-sensitive challenges. After completion, a detailed report is generated for each student, including feedback, scores, and time spent.

In test questions, it is also possible to include narratives, motivational sentences, and help links, which helps maintain the context narrative throughout the test. The feedback can explain the correct answer, provide a final score, and show the time taken, all of which are valuable for gamifying the experience. Navigation rules between questions can also be defined, allowing for a customized flow. Linear navigation was chosen in these activities to simulate the game flow, but in some cases, the challenges were selected randomly from a pool of questions.

The form used to specify the question structure and feedback can be seen in Figure 5.

When creating tests, the teacher needs to select appropriate exercises related to the topic, prepare feedback, and adjust test parameters such as time limits. The teacher also needs to assign points to each question and ensure the setup aligns with the gamified structure.

Test configurations include setting the start date, time, and duration, with the option to enable the LockDown Browser to prevent external distractions. Results are automatically recorded in the Gradebook, and final scores can be used to generate a player ranking.

As stated, ten gamified experiments were implemented once a week, inside the classroom (last half hour of the class), during ten weeks. Table 2 shows the topic of each game, its name, and the tool used.

Each gamified activity consists of around 10 questions, with a maximum of 100 points in total. The time spent by the teacher to implement these activities is divided into three parts: selecting a set of exercises or challenges, creating a context and script for the experiment, and implementing it in the LMS tool. On average, the teacher spends 6 hours for each of these tasks: 2 hours for selecting exercises, 2 hours for creating the context and script, and 2 hours for implementing the activity.