| dc.description.abstract | With the increasing importance of the Second language, English has become a official language in the world. Thus, English learning is one of the most important subjects in education. In order to improve English abilities, there is a need to do repeated practice during students’ learning process. However, such repeated practice not only makes learners feel impatient, but also let them lose learning motivation Therefore, this research develops a digital game-based learning system, where game elements were used to improve the learner′s learning motivation.
Although digital game-based learning has many advantages, it might not be suitable for all learners. This is because digital game-based learning may cause cognitive overload of learners. Many factors affect learners ′ cognitive overload in game-based learning. Among such factors, learner′s spatial abilities were associated with cognitive overload. In addition to cognitive load, the gaming behavior and game performance in game-based learning may be related to learners ′ spatial abilities. Therefore, this research aimed to examine the influences of learners’ spatial abilities on their gaming behavior and game performance in the context of digital game-based learning.
53 students who enrolled in the 4th grade of an elementary school in Taoyuan participated in this study. Based on the results of space proficiency test, they were divided into the high spatial ability group and low spatial ability group. After they interacted with a digital game-based learning system for 80 minutes, the influences of learner′s spatial ability on gaming behavior and game performance were analyzed, and correlations between gaming behavior and game performance were also discussed. Gaming behavior pertained to the frequencies and time of using various assistive tools. Game performance included game scores and task performance. Two approaches were applied to conduct data analysis, including descriptive statistics, t-test, Pearson correlations and one-way ANOVA.
The results of this study that spatial abilities had great impacts on the learner′s gaming behavior and game performance. Learners with a high spatial ability was superior to those with a low spatial ability learners, in terms of game performance. Learners with a low spatial ability more frequently used different types of hints than those with a high spatial ability, in terms of screen description, small maps, the location of enemies and role description. Furthermore, significant differences were found for the time used for small maps and the location of enemies. More specifically, learners with a low spatial ability spent more times for using the small maps and the location of enemies than those with a high spatial ability. In addition, the study found that the effect of spatial ability has no significant differences on learning performance. On correlation, a positive correlation existed between the frequencies of using the small maps and role description. The frequencies of using image resolution, Chinese interpretation and speech recognition were positively correlated to each other. This study found that the abovementioned correlations found for these two groups were similar. The frequencies of using image resolution, Chinese interpretation and speech recognition were positively correlated to each other. This study found that the abovementioned correlations found for these two groups were similar.
The aforesaid findings demonstrated that this thesis will make contributions to digital game-based learning. Firstly, the findings were useful to understand the influences of spatial ability on learner′s gaming behavior and game performance. Secondly, such findings can be applied to support researchers, learners, designers and teachers to develop game learning system which can adapt to the needs of learners with different spatial abilities. | en_US |