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Digital entertainment games frequently address current societal issues that are also dealt with in geography education, such as climate change or sustainable city development, and give various opportunities for learning. However, in order to be fully able to determine the games’ educational potential and to instruct meaningful reflection on them in class, the designers’ approaches to realism regarding these topics need to be understood. Therefore, [the authors] have developed a model of realism in games and conducted 9 interviews with 10 experts from the entertainment game industry about their understanding of and dealing with realism concerning the represented geographical topics. In many cases, the interviewees’ approach to incorporating real-world issues can be regarded as beneficial for their games’ educational potential, and some designers even pursued learning goals. However, [the authors] also identified approaches that can result in questionable presentations of real societal issues. [The authors] found the most problematic one to be the prioritization of player expectations for the sake of perceived realism. This approach may lead to the depiction of stereotypes and common misconceptions. The results presented in our study may help teachers to prepare reflection on such misrepresentations in class, or designers to become more aware of the educational implications of different forms of game realism. (Orig.).

This paper examines whether the commercial digital simulation game “Cities: Skylines” enables players to simulate sustainable city development. The analysis consists of an analytical framework founded on the literature regarding the UN Sustainable Development Goal “Sustainable Cities and Communities” (SDG 11, United Nations). The study applies the analytical framework to the city builder, observing that many aspects of sustainable city development can be employed when building a city in “Cities: Skylines”. While the analysis suggests that the in-game feedback is very neutral vis-à-vis sustainability, the game offers a vast digital space where players and pupils learning geography can practically experience and experiment with the complexity of urban geography. Thus, “Cities: Skylines” could offer the opportunity to familiarize learners with “Sustainable Cities and Communities”. The analysis helps to assess the extent to which the game can be of educational benefit for geography education despite its commercial character. The paper concludes with educational implications and emphasizes the opportunity to experience sustainable city development in the digital simulation game “Cities: Skylines”.

The present study investigates the influence of peer coaching on the depth of reflection on the content of digital games in geography education. The results show that the combination of a reflection diary and reflection coaching in the debriefing session significantly increases the depth of reflection at different levels. In particular, students were able to formulate more precise and critical statements at the level of comparison between the game world and reality, as well as at the level of self-reflection. Working in tandem and targeted questions from the trainers proved to be key success factors in promoting depth of reflection. The study shows the importance of combining written and oral reflection after using digital games and provides impetus for integrating digital games and reflection methods into the classroom.

The current socio-ecological challenges and phenomena that are major topics of geography education, like climate change and migration, are highly complex. Maturity in these contexts requires a networked way of thinking, and a systemic competence that is difficult to develop in geography classes alone. Digital games that simulate complex systems which include the pressing issues of today’s challenges may be a useful supplement to foster systems thinking. In this study, we develop a framework to assess the complexity of in-game systems. A subsequent analysis of a selection of current commercial strategy and simulation games shows how system complexity is designed differently in the various games. Based on these results, we make recommendations for the selection and use of different games in formal and informal learning contexts. (Orig.).

In conventional digital game-based learning, geographic maps are generally used to provide students with the whole picture of the gaming contexts, while the concepts to be learned are separately presented as individual gaming objects. Scholars have indicated the problems of such a gaming content design, in which students could encounter difficulties making effective connections between spatial and conceptual knowledge during the learning process, which may influence their learning effectiveness. As a result, it is a crucial and challenging issue to assist students in organizing spatial and conceptual knowledge in contextual learning environments, such as digital games. To solve this problem, an integrated concept map and geographic map-based digital gaming (CM-GMDG) approach is proposed to demonstrate how spatial and conceptual knowledge can be connected in the development of digital games. To investigate the effectiveness of the approach, a quasi-experiment was conducted in a social science course. Two classes of seventh graders in a high school participated in this study. The experimental group (N = 39) adopted the CM-GMDG approach while the control group (N = 23) adopted the conventional geographic map-based digital gaming (GMDG) approach. The results showed that the students using the CM-GMDG approach significantly outperformed those using the GMDG approach on learning achievement. Moreover, the learning behavioral pattern analysis results showed that compared with the control group, students in the experimental group more frequently engaged in knowledge-acquiring behaviors, such as reading learning materials and completing learning tasks. On the other hand, the control group gave up on the learning tasks more frequently by switching the gaming scenes and stopping answering questions. This indicated that the CM-GMDG approach was more helpful for guiding students to focus on their learning tasks than the GMDG approach.

In this study, a diary was developed and used by students to reflect on digital games in geography lessons. The students’ reflection results, through the use of the diary, were compared with reflections without instructional guidance. These results show a significant improvement in reflection through the use of the reflection diary compared to a previous study. Through the combination of lessons, play phases, and the reflection diary, a learning arrangement that enables in-depth reflections at different levels of reflection was created. The medium plays a decisive role by taking the pupils out of their role as players and enabling a critical distance to the game. With the help of the reflection diary, students should be able to better reflect on the game. The reflection diary is integrated into the lessons. It also shows that subject-specific lessons are indispensable for reflecting on the gaming experience in order to counteract subject-specific misconceptions.

Digital technology has shaped the way humans interact with information and create knowledge. These conditions have in turn shaped a generation of people who experienced virtual environments very early in their lives and are often referred to as digital natives. This group of people has a particular way of communicating and interacting. It characterizes their affinity spaces and the many experiences with virtual worlds and digital games. In digital games, the separation between entertainment and learning is becoming less pronounced. Many game titles have been used for educational purposes. An iconic example is Minecraft, which has been used formally in some schools to teach topics on the environment. However, studies on formal topics in Geography are conspicuously absent, and we therefore selected Minecraft to understand how digital natives learn about Geography given the character of its virtual environment. To this aim, we developed a learning task scenario for global climate zones. The scenario was tested in two pilot studies with two different groups of participants. The results indicate that participants already share some degree of knowledge about the game environment, despite differences within the digital native group. Using the results of several pilot studies, we discuss the design choices to engage players in the game’s learning activity.

The main objective of this research was to develop a web-based geographic information system (GIS) based on a detailed analysis of user preferences from the perspective of forest research, management and education. An anonymous questionnaire was used to elicit user preferences for a hardware platform and evaluations of web-mapping applications, geographic data, and GIS tools. Mobile GIS was used slightly more often than desktop GIS. Web-mapping applications that provide information to the public and the present research results were rated higher than the forest management application. Orthophotos for general purposes and thematic layers such as forest stand maps, soils, protected areas, cadastre, and forest roads were preferred over highly specialized layers. Tools for data searching, map printing, measuring, and drawing on digital maps were rated higher than tools for online map editing and geographic analysis. The analysis of user preferences was used to design a new multipurpose GIS portal for the University Forest Enterprise. The GIS portal was designed with a three-tier architecture on top of the software library for managing user access, working interactively with digital maps, and managing web map applications. The web map applications focus on tools and geographic information not available elsewhere, specifically timber harvest and logistics, research plots, and hunting game management.

Using the guiding phenomena of Cherokee fire pots (ones that you can hold in your hand without being burned even when lit), the ideas of thermal conduction are introduced through a series of simple hands-on activities. Since thermodynamics is often a difficult topic for students and teachers alike, having this grounding phenomenon, combined with the first-person narratives offered in the podcast clips, represents an excellent example of how best to integrate media into the classroom in a way that profoundly enhances instruction. Because of the nature of the resource, students who struggle with reading will have no problem. ON THE WEB Common Sense Education; https;//www, commonsense.org/education Science Friday; https://www.sciencefriday.com Test Tubes * DCIs: 5 of 5 I tried to find any that were not covered and could not. * CCs: 2 of 5 It did not have any reference to these, so that coverage will be up to the teacher. * SEPs: 5 of 5 One of the best, the resources are searchable by SEP! &&& * Ease of Use for Teachers: 5 of 5 * Interest to Students: 4 of 5

Education has a crucial role to play in helping meet the Sustainable Development Goals, for which the initial training of university teachers, and its evaluation, are all essential. In this context, the authors developed an outdoor work task, consisting of an orientation game in ‘medieval Madrid’. The main objective was to show future teachers how they can enable their own students to value cultural heritage in order to acquire sustainability competencies. The task was evaluated by participants using a questionnaire, in order to make them aware of the acquired competencies. A gamification component was added to the outdoor task to create a healthy competitive environment. In this way, future teachers were able to observe how a teaching activity is evaluated; learn how to organize a didactic activity that can be extrapolated to other territorial and heritage realities; and employ their mobile devices to learn the foundations of sustainability in heritage management. Additionally, they acquired teaching competencies that promoted quality education and contributed towards two of the Sustainable Development Goals, specifically: 4 “Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all” and 11 “Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable”.