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Pomodoro as Minimal Gamification
Tuesday, April 16th, 2013 03:14 pmGrading papers is the bane of any teacher's life, unless they teach the age-group where it's tears, runny noses and constant requests to go to the toilet. Don't get me wrong: I don't mind reading student papers as such; I just don't like having to read fifty on the same topic, highlighting the grammar errors as I go. As a university teacher interested in gamification, I have been trying to think of ways to gamify grading for some time, with remarkably little success. The closest I've come - and it has been quite a breakthrough - has been using Pomodoro. For those unfamiliar with it, the Pomodoro technique is a simple time-management system where you work intensely for a set time, usually twenty minutes, take a five-minute break, then repeat, with a longer break every now and then. You can use a kitchen timer (hence the name, since they are often tomato-shaped) or some software; I've been using a GNOME3 extension.
Those who are by now sick of hearing every crappy behaviour modification technique called "gamification" will immediately object that this is not in the least game-like. But bear with me. On the surface, it doesn't look very different from what I was doing before: I would read a paper, enter the grade, then take a break before going on to the next one. All I'm doing is setting the times, which is simple efficiency, preventing the classic "I'll just check my mail for five minutes," turning into an hour-long ramble round the Web. However, there is a little more to it.
First let me describe the system as I used it. I normally take 20-30 minutes to grade an essay of the type I was working on. I reckoned I could keep it down at the bottom end by working intensively and avoiding distractions, so I started with the default Pomodoro routine: 20 minutes work, 5 minutes for a short break, and 15 minutes for one of the rarer long breaks. If it took longer than 20 minutes, I broke the Pomodoro principle and sacrificed some of my break; if it took less, I allowed myself to do some other computer activity, like checking my mail or social media until it was time for the break. Breaks themselves had to be away from the computer. In the short breaks I would stretch and do breathing exercises (baduanjin) or perform a quick domestic activity like making a cup of tea or hanging up the washing. In the long breaks, I'd do taijiquan, take a shower or have something to eat. After a while I was able to reduce the work part to 17 minutes and also reduced the long break to 13 minutes. Using this method, I graded 36 papers over the weekend, and that allowed for a couple of lie-ins, a walk and a fair amount of TV. That is not particularly remarkable; what was remarkable was that I enjoyed it, and it was this that got me thinking about gamification.
I've defined a game elsewhere as "a structured activity designed to facilitate play," which means that the measure of successful gamification is not the presence of any particular piece of game mechanics but the cultivation of a playful attitude. And as I've also said elsewhere, there isn't a sharp distinction between play and work, or even a spectrum from play to work; there is a spectrum from play to drudgery, and work can come almost anywhere on it, even though lamentably it tends to be closer to drudgery. The fact that I was feeling enthusiastic about an activity that normally has me tearing my hair out alerted me to the fact that I was, at least to some extent, playing at grading as well as working at it.
What made this activity a little more playful, I think, was the pomodoro gave me something to concentrate on outside the task itself. I was working hard to finish each paper on time, not so I could get through the bloody papers and eventually go and do something else (that is the the mind of the drudge) but simply for the pleasure of meeting the target. Similarly, shaving a few minutes off my time-per-paper and reducing the pomodoro time to 17 minutes was like levelling-up - the reward was not that I would eventually finish grading quicker (although I would)but simply the knowledge that I'd beaten my own score.
Those who are by now sick of hearing every crappy behaviour modification technique called "gamification" will immediately object that this is not in the least game-like. But bear with me. On the surface, it doesn't look very different from what I was doing before: I would read a paper, enter the grade, then take a break before going on to the next one. All I'm doing is setting the times, which is simple efficiency, preventing the classic "I'll just check my mail for five minutes," turning into an hour-long ramble round the Web. However, there is a little more to it.
First let me describe the system as I used it. I normally take 20-30 minutes to grade an essay of the type I was working on. I reckoned I could keep it down at the bottom end by working intensively and avoiding distractions, so I started with the default Pomodoro routine: 20 minutes work, 5 minutes for a short break, and 15 minutes for one of the rarer long breaks. If it took longer than 20 minutes, I broke the Pomodoro principle and sacrificed some of my break; if it took less, I allowed myself to do some other computer activity, like checking my mail or social media until it was time for the break. Breaks themselves had to be away from the computer. In the short breaks I would stretch and do breathing exercises (baduanjin) or perform a quick domestic activity like making a cup of tea or hanging up the washing. In the long breaks, I'd do taijiquan, take a shower or have something to eat. After a while I was able to reduce the work part to 17 minutes and also reduced the long break to 13 minutes. Using this method, I graded 36 papers over the weekend, and that allowed for a couple of lie-ins, a walk and a fair amount of TV. That is not particularly remarkable; what was remarkable was that I enjoyed it, and it was this that got me thinking about gamification.
I've defined a game elsewhere as "a structured activity designed to facilitate play," which means that the measure of successful gamification is not the presence of any particular piece of game mechanics but the cultivation of a playful attitude. And as I've also said elsewhere, there isn't a sharp distinction between play and work, or even a spectrum from play to work; there is a spectrum from play to drudgery, and work can come almost anywhere on it, even though lamentably it tends to be closer to drudgery. The fact that I was feeling enthusiastic about an activity that normally has me tearing my hair out alerted me to the fact that I was, at least to some extent, playing at grading as well as working at it.
What made this activity a little more playful, I think, was the pomodoro gave me something to concentrate on outside the task itself. I was working hard to finish each paper on time, not so I could get through the bloody papers and eventually go and do something else (that is the the mind of the drudge) but simply for the pleasure of meeting the target. Similarly, shaving a few minutes off my time-per-paper and reducing the pomodoro time to 17 minutes was like levelling-up - the reward was not that I would eventually finish grading quicker (although I would)but simply the knowledge that I'd beaten my own score.
