Gamification refers to the use of game elements in non-play environments (Deterding, Dixon, Khaled, & Nacke, 2011). It involves using of game elements in a useful way in the environment instead of designing the environment as a game completely (Deterding et al., 2011). Game mechanics and dynamics constitute the basic elements of gamification. It is important to use these basic elements, the basic elements to make learning environments fun and useful.
Gamification in education is not just about adding a game to teaching of knowledge or skills; rather, it consists of integrating engaging games that have the potential to facilitate the learning of learners into the current learning environment.
Elements of gamification, initially used in real classroom environments, are also in use in computer-assisted education through digital games today. Prensky (2001) emphasizes that the presence of interaction, problem solving, fun, set goals, rules, scenario, instant feedback and competition in digital games would enhance educational usability of digital games.
It is known that primary school-level children's acceptance of digital computer games is affected significantly by rich learning content and ease of use (Cheng & Su, 2012). Besides, effective course design is known to increase the educational value of digital games (Hong et al., 2009).
Digital games that are not well designed and not clearly known how to use in the course would bring disadvantages together (Hong et al., 2009). It is an important problem that students get drifted away from the goal in the game environment and the games with teaching purposes turn into games with entertainment purposes only (Kebritchi et al., 2009). In order to overcome this situation, it is crucial that the teaching contents and the game elements have a balanced place in games and the learning activities to be realized in the game are expressed clearly (Ribeiro, Coelho, & Aguiar, 2011). It implies that providing target-oriented customized guidance and support to pupils should be taken into consideration in the design of digital games (Papestrergiou, 2009).
For the purpose of guiding and evaluating students, determining their educational needs, advising and realizing individualised learning by following their learning process step by step; the importance of Adaptive Intelligent Tutoring Systems (AITS), built on artificial intelligence techniques, is becoming outstanding among computer-aided education technologies (Huang et al., 2012). The aim of AITS is to teach students desired behaviours by finding out students' knowledge or errors and helping them to correct their errors (Huang et al., 2012).
Therefore, it is thought that using digital games together with AITS, which can provide instant feedback, step-by-step support and orientation to learners in the learning process, can have a meaningful effect (Tobias & Duffy, 2009) because while digital game-based learning offers a learning environment that is fun, motivational, increases engagement, and supports active learning support; AITS provides students with opportunities to work with software which can be adapted according to their instant performance, individual traits and needs (Zapušek & Rugelj, 2013).
Departing from the foregoing, this study aims to describe the path and tools used in the gamification process of the ARTIBOS, an adaptive intelligent tutoring system, so that adaptive intelligent instructional system designers can integrate affective qualities into the system.
So, the study was carried out seeking answer for the following questions:
How can an adaptive intelligent tutoring system gamified?
What game dynamics can be used for adaptive intelligent tutoring systems?
What game mechanics can be used for adaptive intelligent tutoring systems?