If you’re using WordPress as an online course platform, you’re probably always on the lookout for ways to keep your learners engaged.
There are a lot of tactics that you can use, but one that you might have overlooked is gamification.
Gamification is exactly what it sounds like – it’s applying the typical elements of game playing (points scoring, competition, and so on) to another activity; online courses in this case.
In this post, you’re going to learn how you can use gamification to improve your online course platform with tactics such as achievement points, badges, leaderboards, and more. More specifically, we’ll show you how to set up these strategies using the popular LearnDash plugin.
To tie with this concept of gamification, we’re also going to talk about “flow” – why flow is something to aim for and how gamification principles can support the concept of flow.
Why Use Gamification for Your Online Course?
At a high level, gamification helps you make your courses more engaging. If students find your courses more engaging, they’ll spend more time learning and interacting with your courses, which is exactly what you want.
If your goal is to make money from your courses, gamification also has a positive effect on your bottom line. Engaged students are more likely to maintain their subscriptions, purchase new courses, recommend your courses to their friends, and so on.
Now, you might be wondering how gamification actually works to make your courses more engaging.
Well, there are a lot of principles at work here, but the one that we’re focused on is “flow”, a term coined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and discussed in depth in his book, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience.
What Is Flow and How Does It Apply to Online Courses?
Flow is that state where you get totally immersed in what you’re doing. It’s “effortless attention”, the type where you’re so engaged in a task that you look up at the clock and wonder how two hours went past.
We can pretty much guarantee that you’ve experienced the flow state at some point in your life, even if you didn’t know it by that name.
You can see the natural appeal of flow and how helping your learners achieve it can make them more engaged. If your course platform encourages learners to enter the flow state, they’ll be more likely to…
- Spend more time on your course platform.
- Learn your course material more deeply.
- Explore more areas of your course platform.
- …and so on.
What Are the Elements of Flow?
If you want to support the flow state, you need to focus on incorporating the following details in your courses:
- Clear goals and clear
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This article was written by Colin Newcomer and originally published on WP Mayor.