Journal of Engineering Education Transformations

Abstract

The young (millennial) learners are not particularly motivated only by traditional classroom-based, one-way presentation/ lecture-based approaches as they are exposed to digital lives. Furthermore, in an outcome-based education system, all features of teaching focus on course outcomes. Therefore, the teachers face the challenge of student engagement. The work in this paper is regarding the active learning method for the final year students of the ‘Information and Cyber Security' course. In this activity, the students design (in a group of 2) and build the game using the software platform of their choice. The game is built around the CIA triad (privacy, integrity. and availability), network security concepts and protocols. After designing and building the prototype of the game, the students for assessment and feedback play the game with their class mates and the faculty members. Then classmates and teachers give scores for each core drive on the Octalysis tool. This helps student game designers to improve the weak core. Octalysis is a gamification framework designed as an octagon shaped with 8 core drivers representing each side. The entire exercise is stimulating and motivates the students as indicated in their feedback of the students (68% of students rated excellent). Gamification by students proved to enhance student learning by promoting critical thinking and problem-solving skills, as evident from the assessment. Finally, course coordinator evaluates the game using rubrics that were shared with students beforehand. The evaluation rubric focuses on the title of the game, content, creativity, rules, instructions of the game, and cooperative efforts. Game design and implementation by students activity proves that the greatest benefit is that the maximum learning happens in the design process (for game designers) compared to players. Further, the students also learn to work in groups and solve problems. Furthermore, the most significant of the entire activity is learning of cyber security concepts and protocols in a fun way.

Keywords—Active learning, Game design, Octalysis framework, assessment, evaluation and cyber security