How to Gamify and Motivate Yourself with Innovative Educational Apps

There is no denying that education can sometimes be boring. Studying texts books. Reading charts and graphs. Dissecting old literature. This can be a chore and make studying difficult! Your work and education don’t have to be boring though – you just have to know where to look! In today’s modern world of technology, you can improve your studies no end. You can also make use of different apps that bring education to life and give you a fun experience.

This is what we will look at in this article – apps and websites that gamify education. By gamify, we mean applying elements of game playing – turning something relatively boring into a fun game. As you will see, there is a myriad of educational apps that utilize gamification. These apps can help give motivation, and make learning an enjoyable experience:

1. Duolingo

Learning a language can be one of the most difficult tasks a student can encounter. It can be frustrating and tedious. Duolingo looks to address this and make learning a language a fun experience.

This is a free learning service for languages and boasts a user base of over 80 million students and teachers. It is actually the largest mobile learning app in the world. Students can make use of fun games and tasks and learn a new language in a fun and exciting way. The app is available for iOS, Android, and Windows and caters to many different languages.

2. Minecraft Edu

Minecraft is one of the most popular online games in the world. This game has two modes – survival and creator mode. Creator mode allows you to explore your imagination and build practically whatever you can think of – castles, cities, and entire worlds if you wish.

The popularity of Minecraft has of course been transferred into education. There is a whole Minecraft Edu section available. Within this section of the game, you can find whole lessons that allow students to learn but have fun with the building and crafting mechanics at the same time.

3. Socrative

Socrative is one of the best-known online learning platforms with gamification. This platform provides several different modes that give a diverse learning structure for both teachers and students.

The modes include a simple question and answer system, the space race, and exit ticket to tie up lessons. The space race is the most fun aspect – students must guide their spaceship through space and past asteroids – they do so by answering questions.

This game mode is so much fun – students can enjoy the beautiful space graphics but also improve their knowledge at the same time.

4. Kahoot!

Kahoot! Is one of the most fun gamification educational apps we have found. The sounds, music, colors and graphics used are superb. This company really knows how to make learning fun for students. The interface is fantastic and teachers can easily use this platform to create interesting lessons. A game pin is required to use Kahoot! And this is provided when you sign up to the platform.

To make things more interesting, there is a point system – this promotes friendly competition between students and gives rewards to those who continually excel. Students can learn about anything from natural elements and animals, to geography and times tables – every subject is catered for!

5. Tinycards

Tinycards is actually an app created by Duolingo so you know that it is going to be amazing quality! This app and website allow you to create useful flash cards. These flash cards are fantastic as they provide a visual depiction of what you are studying. For example, there is a set of cards relating to architectural styles and periods – each card features a well-known building together with the time period the style arose.

You can find cards for hundreds of different subjects. Furthermore, you can create your own cards and add your own images. The cards really are useful and can help improve your learning process. Examples of other cards include colors, famous monuments, and flags of world countries.

6. Zondle

Zondle is actually a free website that has a host of resources that students can enjoy. This site is completely free to use and contains hundreds of different educational games. The selection really is fantastic and every type of game category is covered – from puzzles to arcade games. What makes this site even more amazing is that you can actually create your own games too! This site was created in 2011 and since then has amassed a huge catalog of games for students and teachers.

7. Virtonomics

This is actually a game that is made for higher education students who are studying business and economics. It has a huge following and is played by millions of people around the world. Everyone from entrepreneurs and businesswomen to college students can take part. What is this game about? It is a game of online business. Virtonomics contains a fully realized virtual economy that utilizes AI technology. The economy evolves and users must work together to make it successful. It really is a great concept and one of the most interesting apps in this list.

Why not give some of these awesome apps a try today? Don’t let your education be a slog! Both students and teachers can make use of these amazing apps. They can turn education into something fun and ultimately benefit from an enjoyable experience.