Impact of gamification on reading and writing skills in higher education students

Abstract

Introduction: education in general, goes through constant changes in each of its stages, even more so with technological advancement, where the linking of science with innovation, encourages the significant development of skills in students, even more so when the person must communicate or write texts, for this reason, eighth-year students of basic general education at the "Sagrado Corazón de Jesús" Educational Unit in the city of Latacunga, present very low levels of reading comprehension and clear writing, which impacts low academic performance in this area. For this reason, addressing reading and writing skills from the use of gamification, and based on previous research, positively favors learning, where learning by playing and overcoming challenges, motivates the student, and generates interest. Objective: to analyze the impact of gamification on the reading and writing skills of 8th grade students of Basic General Education at the “Sagrado Corazón de Jesús” Private Educational Unit. Methodology: the research paradigm is quantitative, with a quasi-experimental design for a single work group, cross-sectional, and using theoretical, empirical, and mathematical methods. A non-probability sample, with the intention of the researchers, is used, consisting of 20 eighth-year students in parallel basic general education “B”. Results: within the intervention, through a ten-question questionnaire validated by experts and analyzed for reliability, students showed favorable perceptions toward the use of gamification in the teaching and learning process aimed at acquiring reading and writing skills. In another sense, after administering the pretest and posttest to the study group, a 13.58% improvement was seen in text comprehension and subsequent writing. Conclusion: gamification, like the various existing innovative strategies, has a positive impact on reading and writing skills, since, by integrating technology into the learning process, students obtain better results compared to traditional teaching and learning methods in Language and Literature, where the combination of playful elements such as entertainment, challenges and challenges combined with curricular content, turn gamification into a strategy capable of fostering better skills and abilities in students both in reading comprehension and written production. General Area of Study: Education. Specific area of study: Language and Literature. Type of study: Original articles.