Abstract:

One of the assumptions in information & communication technology (ICT) education is that the ICT-enhanced (soft) skills are as important (if not even more important) compared to the ICT (hard) skills. Recent research in the education curricula of several countries put emphasis on the integration of soft skills (such as working together as a team) in the ICT curriculum for children aged 10-12. Still, the assessment of the children's ICT-enhanced skills poses a serious barrier. The existing measuring tools such as the pen-and-paper test only provide a one-dimensional assessment; these methods measure how well the children know the skills, not how well they can apply them. This paper proposes an alternative/complementary assessment tool by means of a game development framework. The game development framework is the basis for providing an additional dimension of how well the children can apply the skills in realistic scenarios during the assessment process, thereby measuring the children's ICT-enhanced skills more holistically. A sample computer game in support of the assessment of ICT-enhanced skills is created based on the framework by means of the Scratch programming language.

Keywords:

Scratch, ICT-Enhanced Skills, Educational Games, Development Framework, e-learning.