Gamification in Engineering Education: The Use of Classcraft Platform to Improve Motivation and Academic Performance
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Thank you for the presentation of the study.
The main problem reading it, is that the author(s) have more background than the reader. See remarks.
Also, you write: The main goal is to determine how gamification ……etc. However the study and conclusion is not really about how but in mine opinion: to what extent. The only how is using Classcraft. But the research is about the effect of it.
Remarks:
65: Classcraft is here falling from the sky. I suggest a sentence to introduce it: To support creativity skills …use Classcraft.
Also gamification [line 72] mention it in de section before.
100: using —-> used??
103: Please explain: experience points (or you mean as line 67?)
112: Finally, the behaviours that remove experience point to students are: ——->
You mean: the behaviors that decrease the number of experience points are
119: “ As a consequence of these points, they were able to learn powers, level up and fall down 119 in battle. “ this is very cryptic. They (the students?) powers? Level up and fall down in battle???
Perhaps more info about Classcraft is handy.
135: shield????
165: I suggest you choose control group OR reference group. Not both.
184: You note 0.005. However in line 170 you noted 0,05. Or is this something else?
Author Response
Reviewer 1
Thank you for the presentation of the study.The main problem reading it, is that the author(s) have more background than the reader. See remarks.
Also, you write: The main goal is to determine how gamification ……etc. However the study and conclusion is not really about how but in mine opinion: to what extent. The only how is using Classcraft. But the research is about the effect of it.
Thank you very much for your comments. Taking into account your comment, we have modified that sentence:
Line 73. The main goal of this paper is to determine how the use of Classcraft® motivates stu-dents in a Mathematics course during their first year of all the engineering degrees at University Loyola Andalucia.
Remarks:
65: Classcraft is here falling from the sky. I suggest a sentence to introduce it: To support creativity skills …use Classcraft. Also gamification [line 72] mention it in de section before.
Taking into account your comment, we have modified that sentence introducing the application:
Line 65. To support the aforementioned skills through gamification, the authors have proposed the use of Classcraft®, which is a web and mobile application that allow the educator manage a role-playing game with students [6].
100: using —-> used??
Corrected
103: Please explain: experience points (or you mean as line 67?)
In order to clarify this fact, “experience” has been included in line 69.
112: Finally, the behaviours that remove experience point to students are: ——->
You mean: the behaviors that decrease the number of experience points are
Thank you very much for your comment. This sentence has been corrected.
119: “ As a consequence of these points, they were able to learn powers, level up and fall down in battle. “ this is very cryptic. They (the students?) powers? Level up and fall down in battle??? Perhaps more info about Classcraft is handy.
That sentence has been corrected. In addition, a reference concerning Classcraft has been included.in order to clarify these concepts and as a suggestion of other referee:
Sanchez, E., Young, S., & Jouneau-Sion, C. (2017). Classcraft: from gamification to ludicization of classroom management. Education and Information Technologies, 22(2), 497-513.
135: shield????
“Shield” has been replaced by “banner”
165: I suggest you choose control group OR reference group. Not both.
“Reference group” has been replaced by “control group”
184: You note 0.005. However in line 170 you noted 0,05. Or is this something else?.
“0.005” has been replaced by “0.05”
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The basic idea for this article is good but the language needs to be greatly improved. Even in the abstract, there was a sentence which did not make sense, namely, "Results showed that the mean mark obtained by control group students was than gamification group students".
The reference list needs to have more recent and relevant works. The literature review needs to have more about the use of avatars and motivation rather than the four Cs.
The scale described in section '2.1.3. Procedure' is a ‘Likert scale’ and should be named accordingly.
There was no mention of a theoretical framework.
Author Response
Reviewer 2
The basic idea for this article is good but the language needs to be greatly improved.
Thank you very much for your extremely helpful comments. The manuscript has been revised not only including your suggestions and those of the rest of the reviewers, but the English has been revised by the MDPI Language Editing Services.
Even in the abstract, there was a sentence which did not make sense, namely, "Results showed that the mean mark obtained by control group students was than gamification group students".
This sentence has been corrected as follows:
Results showed that the mean mark obtained by control group students was higher than those obtained by gamification group students.
The reference list needs to have more recent and relevant works. The literature review needs to have more about the use of avatars and motivation rather than the four Cs.
Several new references have been included in the revised version of the manuscript.
The scale described in section '2.1.3. Procedure' is a ‘Likert scale’ and should be named accordingly.
Done
There was no mention of a theoretical framework.
No theoretical framework has been included, analogous to other manuscripts of this journal and special issue, because the use of Classcraft and gamification is not really the novel topic, but its application in this course and the way to do it. However, numerous references have been included that include this section and related to the theme of this manuscript.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
