Changing the game to improve financial literacy

New first of its kind online program aims to encourage plan members to save more for retirement

TORONTO, Feb. 7, 2014 /CNW/ - Sun Life Financial is the first financial services company in Canada to launch an online program that incorporates a gamification strategy to engage Canadians in learning more about their workplace retirement and savings plans and increase their financial literacy. money UP challenges Canadians to "Learn more" and "Earn more" by completing levels and missions that encompass important retirement and investment planning steps. (continue reading)

The Importance of Financial Literacy

How being well-read can keep you in the black

“No skill is more crucial to the future of a child, or to a democratic and prosperous society, than literacy.” This is a quote from a wonderful piece that ran in the L.A. Times in the late nineties on getting people to read. While the article was referring to general book literacy, I’d argue that this quote is just as valid when speaking of one’s financial literacy. Indeed, a basic understanding of money, the economy and their role in shaping our world is increasingly critical as the general cost of living continues to balloon. (continue reading)

Making The Gamification Of Financial Literacy Work

This is a guest post by Neale Godfrey

Making The Gamification Of Financial Literacy Work

Technology allows for instantaneous feedback and allows for immediate adjustment. The days of kids sitting in a classroom forced to learn the same way, writing down their homework, and waiting for the assignment to be graded and returned, may be fading in the way that they have previously existed. (continue reading)

Gaming, Gamification, and Financial Literacy

The word “gamification” has been so played out, misused, and abused that the phrase alone leaves a lot of folks in the know rolling their eyes.  When I spoke with Doris Rusch, a “gaming expert” (pretty rad credentials, right?!) and current faculty member at the De Paul School of Computing and Digital Media about our mobile application’s design, I mentioned that we were using “gaming dynamics” but that the app itself was not a game.  She in turn referred me to the work of Jesse Schell, game design guru, who has written: “Don’t gamify — pleasurize or improve the motivational design.”  And how do you improve the motivational design?  He suggests you focus on making your user care, by: (continue reading)

Gamification in Banking: From Transactions to Experiences

As Brett King said, banking is no longer somewhere you go but something you do. Over the past decade or so, the banking industry made a tremendous shift from financial services as services to financial services as experiences.

The modern customer is an experiential omnivore and constantly seeks for a better experience. But let’s admit it, banking was never the sexiest experience until agile financial technology companies came into the picture to offer a whole new way to turn bill payments (and other services) into a smooth and seamless, almost one-click process. After some time, we got used to it as well and are looking for the next level, which gamification can very well become. (continue reading)

Sun Life Improves Financial Literacy With Gamification

With Money UP, Sun Life better engages its younger members in financial education and planning for retirement.

Sun Life Financial of Canada has announced the launch of Money UP, an online gamification platform that aims to educate consumers on retirement and investment planning. Sun Life claims to be the first Canadian financial services company to venture into gamification. (continue reading)

Making the Gamification of Financial Literacy Work for Our Kids

Remember when attending school meant sitting in a classroom with each child being expected to learn the same way? We wrote down our homework, handed it in to the teacher and waited for the assignment to be graded and returned. This one size fits all “old school” approach may be going the way of book straps and filmstrips. Technology can add the opportunity for instantaneous feedback and immediate adjustment.

Technology can now be tailored to compliment the individual child’s learning style. Some kids learn via verbal or pictorial illustration, some through kinetic and others through still different means. New technology can pick up on nuances that might otherwise slip through the cracks in traditional learning environments. I’m not suggesting replacement, merely that today, more than ever we have myriad ways to get through to our children and technology can play a vital part of the process.

This idea of using technology as a teaching tool is not novel, but in order to keep our students from merely living behind a screen, we have to take the lessons learned through technological means into the real world. Twenty-five years ago I wrote my first book, Money Doesn’t Grow on Trees,and since then I have devoted much of my career to making our youth more financially literate. Many books later, I needed a new way to connect with today’s kids. The fundamentals of the information I teach have not changed much in the past 25 years — the way we consume that information has changed.

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6 Killer Examples Of Gamification In eLearning

Gamification in eLearning is fast emerging as an effective technique to engage learners. It has found its place under the sun for serious learning (that is, meeting specified learning outcomes). In this article, I will share 6 examples that outline how we have created immersive learning experiences using gamification for varied training needs like induction and onboarding, professional skills enhancement, compliance, soft skills enhancement, and behavioral change programs. (Continue Reading)

Building 21st Century Skills with Digital Games Infographic

Wondering why so many classrooms are gaming rather than studying? Games are not only fun, but they support the development of 21st century skills – skills that are important to build today and into tomorrow.

Over 50 studies show that students using digital games outperform students who don’t. And teachers have reported that students who play together showed improvements in social skills over students who play alone. It’s the reason why the games we developed in SMART lab support communication, communication, creativity and critical thinking skills. (continue reading)

7 eLearning Gamification Tips To Enhance Problem Solving Skills

Problem-solving is one of the most challenging skills to develop. It takes experience, trial-and-error, and lateral thinking to arrive at a solution. In this article, I'll share 7 tips to enhance problem-solving skills with eLearning gamification. (continue reading)

Extra Credits Game Design

Making your first game can be difficult. Remember that your goal is to make a game, any game, not necessarily a complex game like the ones professional teams of game developers in a studio can produce. By starting small and focusing on the basic gameplay, a new game designer can learn a lot about their skills and build on that for their next game (or the next version of their first game). That way, you can actually complete a playable game instead of getting stuck on the details as so many first time game makers do. (continue reading) 

Why Learning Games Succeed Where Traditional Training Fails

Why is everyone always picking on traditional training? And what makes learning games so special anyway? It’s not that we dislike traditional training, we just think there are a lot more benefits to learning games. For example, learning games are fun, competitive, rewarding, interactive, and attention-grabbing. Traditional training is…not any of those. Just to clarify – we’re talking about learning games here, not gamification..... (continue reading)

Digital Learning is Critical for Move to Learner-Centered Instruction

Preparing Today’s Students for Success Requires Moving from Teacher-Directed, One-Size-Fits-All Model to Personalized, Student-Focused Instruction, New Report Finds

Washington, DC – Preparing all students to succeed in today’s increasingly complex world requires a shift from a teacher-centric culture to learner-centered instruction that recognizes students’ individual learning needs, according to a new report from the Alliance for Excellent Education.

The report..... (continue reading)

Why Games & Learning

The meaning of knowing today has shifted from being able to recall and repeat information to being able to find it, evaluate it and use it compellingly at the right time and in the right context.

Education in the early part of the twentieth century tended to focus on the acquisition of basic skills and content knowledge, like reading, writing, calculation, history or science. Many experts believe that success in the twenty-first century depends on education that treats higher order skills, like the ability to think, solve complex problems or interact critically through language and media (continue reading)

Games and Learning

Viewpoint
Games and Learning
Digital games have the potential to bring play back to the learning experience
By Diana G. Oblinger

From a very early age, we learn from games and play. Cops-and-robbers or playing house are role simulations. Parents and preschool teachers use games to teach colors, numbers, names, and shapes; the process is drill and practice. Games engage us, capturing our attention. We willingly spend time on task... (continue reading)

Who's Playing?

Have you ever questioned who's playing games? What ages are focused on Games?  Here is some important information about Games and their audience.  (continue reading)

3 Ways to Engage High Schoolers in Personal Finance

It's a lesson that everyone needs to learn: how to manage money. Yet until recently, most states did not require any financial literacy education.

But in the wake of a turbulent economy and a student debt crisis, some states have changed the status quo. Four states require students to complete a one-semester course devoted to personal finance in high school, according to the Jump$tart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy, and several have legislation for similar requirements in the works.

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Games to Teach Financial Literacy

Financial Literacy Month is April -- just around the corner -- and it's never too early to prepare. Personally, I believe this is a great opportunity to use games in an intentional way to teach students financial literacy skills. Games can be used as a "hook" or anchor activity, as well an instructional activity that is revisited throughout a unit of instruction. A game can help scaffold the learning of important content as well as providing context for application of content. If you really trust the design of the game, it can also be an excellent assessment tool! (continue reading)

Why Game-based Learning Works for Financial Education

Learning to use money wisely isn’t always fun and games for teenagers, who tend to think about everything but managing money — until they run out of it. Enter game-based learning for financial education, a teaching tool that works.

When it comes to knowing the basics of personal finance, young people often have to figure it out on their own: Only 7 percent of high school students1 are financially literate, and fewer than 30 percent2 of adults report being offered financial education at school or college.

Game-based learning is helping to fill this gap, and in ways today’s teens like to learn.

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Game-Based Learning: What it is, Why it Works, and Where it's Going

Deconstruct the fun in any good game, and it becomes clear that what makes it enjoyable is the built-in learning process.

To progress in a game is to learn; when we are actively engaged with a game, our minds are experiencing the pleasure of grappling with (and coming to understand) a new system. This is true whether the game is considered “entertainment”..(continue reading)