Evaluation of the potential of toys as an element for raising awareness and promoting social and civic values in childhood: the case of the Childtizens II Project.
Abstract
Games and toys are valuable educational tools. The CHILDTIZENS Project, co-financed by IVACE and the European Union, is focused on the educational value of games and toys to facilitate awareness and promotion of civic values in childhood. The process includes five phases: the definition of key dimensions that could be promoted through play, the development of assessment and identification tools for the awareness-raising value of play and toys (with the collaboration of 60 experts), their validation with an international study with 1.028 people in 6 European countries, the transfer of the tools and the evaluation of the impact with a study with 370 Spanish families with children between 0 and 9 years old. Four key dimensions for the development of civic values through play were conceptualized: sustainability, gender equality, accessibility, and multiculturalism. In order to recognize the games and toys that can contribute to children’s development, four evaluation scales and four identifying icons were developed. The results indicate that the social perception of the usefulness of the system created is positive (94% of participants). The system makes it possible to identify the awareness-raising potential of games and toys and can be used by the toy industry and civil society. This contributes to adding synergies which lead towards participatory child citizenship, in line with the postulates of the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals.
Downloads
References
Ampatzidou, C. (2019). Reinventing the Rules: Emergent Gameplay for Civic Learning. En M. de Lange y M. de Waal (Eds.), The Hackable City. Digital Media and Collaborative City-Making in the Network Society (pp. 187-203). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2694-3
Antunes, J. G., Barros de Sales, A. y Roche-Lima, A. (2022). Usability Evaluation of Educational Serious Games. En A. Rocha, H. Adeli, G. Dzemyda y F. Moreira (Eds.), Information Systems and Technologies (pp. 381-389). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04826-5_38
Barrera Yánez, A. G., Alonso-Fernández, C. y Fernández Manjón, B. (2021). Review of serious games to educate on gender equality. Eighth International Conference on Technological Ecosystems for Enhancing Multiculturality (TEEM'20). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 662–668. https://doi.org/10.1145/3434780.3436592
Cabero Almenara, J. y Llorente Cejudo, M. C. (2013). La Aplicación del Juicio de Experto como Técnica de Evaluación de las Tecnologías de la Información y Comunicación (TIC). Eduweb, 7(2), 11-22.
Córdoba, E.F., Lara, F. y García, A. (2017). El juego como estrategia lúdica para la educación inclusiva del buen vivir. ENSAYOS, Revista de la Facultad de Educación de Albacete, 32(1).
Corporación Ciudad Accesible. (23 de octubre de 2015). Símbolo Internacional de Accesibilidad. Evolución de un ícono. https://go.uv.es/2aciqXc
Corvera, N. (2011). Participación ciudadana de los niños como sujetos de derechos. Persona y Sociedad, 25(2), 73-99. https://doi.org/10.53689/pys.v25i2.215
Davidson, D. (Ed.). (2008). Beyond fun. Serious Games and Media. ETC Press.
De Jans, S., Van Geit, K., Cauberghe, V., Hudders, L. y De Veirman, M. (2017). Using games to raise awareness: How to co-design serious mini-games? Computers & Education, 110, 77-87. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2017.03.009
Del Moral Pérez, M. E. y Villalustre Martínez, L. (2018). Análisis de serious games anti-bullying: recursos lúdicos para promover habilidades prosociales en escolares. Revista Complutense de Educación, 29(4), 1345-1364. https://doi.org/10.5209/RCED.55419
Del Moral Pérez, M. E., Guzmán Duque, A. P. y Fernández, L. C. (2014). Serious Games: escenarios lúdicos para el desarrollo de las inteligencias múltiples en escolares de primaria. Edutec. Revista Electrónica De Tecnología Educativa, (47), 267. https://doi.org/10.21556/edutec.2014.47.121
Den Haan, R. J. y Van der Voort, M. C. (2018). On Evaluating Social Learning Outcomes of Serious Games to Collaboratively Address Sustainability Problems: A Literature Review. Sustainability, 10(12). https://doi.org/10.3390/su10124529
Devisch, O., Poplin, A. y Sofronie, S. (2016). The Gamification of Civic Participation: Two Experiments in Improving the Skills of Citizens to Reflect Collectively on Spatial Issues. Journal of Urban Technology, 23(2), 81-102. https://doi.org/10.1080/10630732.2015.1102419
Douglas, B. D. y Brauer, M. (2021). Gamification to prevent climate change: a review of games and apps for sustainability. Current Opinion in Psychology, 42, 89-94. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2021.04.008
Gerber, A., Ulrich, M., Wäger, F. X., Roca-Puigròs, M., Gonçalves, J. S. V. y Wäger, P. (2021). Games on Climate Change: Identifying Development Potentials through Advanced Classification and Game Characteristics Mapping. Sustainability, 13. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13041997
Girard, C., Ecalle, J. y Magnan, A. (2013). Serious games as new educational tools: how effective are they? A meta-analysis of recent studies. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 29(3), 207-219. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2729.2012.00489.x
Gómez de la Torre Varga, M. C. (2018). Las implicancias de considerar al niño sujeto de derechos. Revista de Derecho, 14(18), 117-137. http://dx.doi.org/10.22235/rd.v18i2.1703
González-Robles A. y Vázquez-Vílchez M. (2022) Propuesta educativa para promover compromisos ambientales a través de los Objetivos de Desarrollo Sostenible en Bachillerato: el juego S.O.S. Civilizaciones. Revista Eureka sobre Enseñanza y Divulgación de las Ciencias, 19(1), 1103. https://doi.org/10.25267/Rev_Eureka_ensen_divulg_cienc.2022.v19.i1.1103
Huizinga, J. (2008). Homo ludens. El juego y la cultura. Fondo de Cultura Económica.
Iten, N. y Petko, D. (2014). Learning with serious games: Is fun playing the game a predictor of learning success? British Journal of Educational Technology, 47(1), 151-163. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.12226
Jääskä, E., Aaltonen, K. y Kujala, J. (2021). Game-Based Learning in Project Sustainability Management Education. Sustainability, 13(15), https://doi.org/10.3390/su13158204
Jaqueira, A. R., Lavega Burgués, P., Lagardera Otero, F., Aráujo, P. y Rodrigues, M. (2014). Educando para la paz jugando: género y emociones en la práctica de juegos cooperativos competitivos. Educatio Siglo XXI, 32(1), 15–32. https://doi.org/10.6018/j/194071
Johnson, D., Horton, E., Mulcahy, R. y Foth, M. (2017). Gamification and serious games within the domain of domestic energy consumption: A systematic review. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 73, 249-264. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2017.01.134
Jover, G. y Payà Rico, A. (2013). Juego, educación y aprendizaje. La actividad lúdica en la pedagogía infantil. Bordón, Revista De Pedagogía, 65(1), 13-18.
Katsaliaki, K. y Mustafee, N. (2015). Edutainment for Sustainable Development: A Survey of Games in the Field. Simulation & Gaming, 46(6), 647–672. https://doi.org/10.1177/1046878114552166
Kniestedt, I., Lefter, I., Lukosch, S. y Brazier, F. M. (2022). Re-framing engagement for applied games: A conceptual framework. Entertainment Computing, 41. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.entcom.2021.100475.
Lämsä, J., Hämäläinen, R., Aro, M., Koskimaa, R. y Äyrämö, S. (2018). Games for enhancing basic reading and maths skills: A systematic review of educational game design in supporting learning by people with learning disabilities. British Journal of Educational Technology, 49(4), 596-607. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.12639
Michael, D. y Chen, S. (2006). Serious games: games that educate, train and inform. Thomson Course Technology.
Morse, J. M. (2015). Analytic Strategies and Sample Size. Qualitative Health Research, 25(10), 1317–1318. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049732315602867
Munirrah Razali, N. E., Zuarni Ramli, R., Mohamed, H., Mat Zin, N. A., Rosdi, F. y Mat Diah, N. (2022). Identifying and validating game design elements in serious game guideline for climate change. Heliyon, 8(1). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e08773
Naciones Unidas. (2015). Transformar nuestro mundo: la Agenda 2030 para el Desarrollo Sostenible (A/RES/70/1). United Nations.
Nietzsche, F. (2012). Más allá del bien y del mal. Alianza Editorial.
Nuryadin, A., Amelia, D. N. y Aryanto, S. (2022). Harnessing Serious Games For Developing Indonesian Elementary School Students’ Critical Thinking Attitudes. NATURALISTIC: Jurnal Kajian Penelitian Pendidikan Dan Pembelajaran, 6(2), 1248–1461. https://doi.org/10.35568/naturalistic.v6i2.1406
Ochoa Silva, F. A. y Chalmeta, R. (2020). Aplicación y tendencias de los juegos serios como herramienta didáctica para la sostenibilidad. Etic@ net: Revista científica electrónica de Educación y Comunicación en la Sociedad del Conocimiento, 20(2), 242-261. https://doi.org/10.30827/eticanet.v20i2.16548
Patton, M. (2002). Qualitative research and evaluation methods. SAGE.
Pereira, G., Brisson, A., Prada, R., Paiva, A., Bellotti, F., Kravcik, M. y Klamma, R. (2012). Serious Games for Personal and Social Learning & Ethics: Status and Trends. Procedia Computer Science, 15, 53-65. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procs.2012.10.058
Ramírez, M. S. y García-Peñalvo, F. J. (2018). Co-creación e innovación abierta: Revisión sistemática de literatura. Comunicar, 54(1), 9-18. https://doi.org/10.3916/C54-2018-01
Ritterfeld, U., Cody, M. y Vorderer, P. (2009). Serious Games: Mechanisms and Effects. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203891650
Romano, M., Díaz, P. y Aedo, I. (2021). Gamification-less: may gamification really foster civic participation? A controlled field experiment. Journal of Ambient Intelligence and Humanized Computing. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12652-021-03322-6
Schijven, M. P. y Kikkawa, T. (2022). Diversity Games. Simulation & Gaming, 53(2), 95-96. https://doi.org/10.1177/10468781221077325
Stanitsas, M., Kirytopoulos, K. y Vareillesc, E. (2019). Facilitating sustainability transition through serious games: A systematic literature review. Journal of Cleaner Production, 208, 924-936. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2018.10.157
Valverde Berrocoso, J. (2013). Serious Games para el aprendizaje en red. En F. I. Revuelta Domínguez y G. A. Esnaola Horacek (Eds.), Videojuegos en redes sociales: perspectivas del «edutainment» y la pedagogía lúdica en el aula (pp. 177-191). Laertes.
Xiao, Y. y Watson, M. (2019). Guidance on Conducting a Systematic Literature Review. Journal of Planning Education and Research, 39(1), 93-112. https://doi.org/10.1177/0739456X17723971
Copyright (c) 2025 Servicio de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Murcia
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Original work publishes in this journal is subject to the following terms:
1. Murcia University Press (the publishing house) holds the copyright of the publishes work, and favours and allows their reutilization under the use license stated in point 2.
© Servicio de Publicaciones, Universidad de Murcia, 2015
2. Work is published in the electronic edition under a license (Creative Commons Reconocimiento-NoComercial-SinObraDerivada 4.0 España (legal text). They can be copied, used, disseminated, transmitted and publicly presented, as long as: i) authorship and original publication source is acknowledged (journal, publishing house and URL of the work); ii) are not used for commercial purposes; iii) the existence and specifications of this use license is stated.
3. Conditions for self-archive. Authors are allowed and encouraged to disseminate electronically the pre-pint (before review) and/or post-print (accepted for publication) versions of their work before their publication since that favours earlier circulation and dissemination resulting in an increased chance for the authors to be cited and for the work to reach a bigger share of the academic community. Colour: RoMEO: green.
