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A PRELIMINARY STUDY ON BINGO DARE: STUDENTS’ OPINION ON THE

USEFULNESS OF THE LANGUAGE GAME

Conference Paper · October 2019

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 ELSA@INSPIRED 2019
UiTM Perak Branch
Impiana Hotel, 17- 18 September 2019

A PRELIMINARY STUDY ON BINGO DARE: STUDENTS’ OPINION ON

THE USEFULNESS OF THE LANGUAGE GAME

Siti Aishah Taib*1, Nadzrah Sa’adan2, Norhisyam Jenal3, Fariza Ahmad Sanusy4, Syahida
Afryna Sabarhan5 and Azwa Najihah Ahmad6

1, 2
Academy of Language Studies, Universiti Teknologi MARA Cawangan Johor Kampus Pasir Gudang,
Masai, MALAYSIA.
3
Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA Cawangan Johor Kampus Pasir Gudang,
Masai, MALAYSIA.
4, 5, 6
Faculty of Civil Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA Cawangan Johor Kampus Pasir Gudang,
Masai, MALAYSIA.
(E-mail: aishah711@uitm.edu.my, nadzr210@uitm.edu.my)

ABSTRACT
The purpose of this paper is to present the findings from a case study that was carried out in order to
discover ESL students’ opinion on the usefulness of a language game, Bingo Dare. The game was
developed by 3 ESL students with guidance from a lecturer who acted as a supervisor. It was then
played by a class of ESL students (n = 32) in 4 ESL lessons. A set of questionnaire was distributed to
the respondents after the last game in order to answer the 3 research questions: to investigate ESL
students’ opinion on the usefulness of Bingo Dare on ESL learning, to investigate ESL students’
opinion on the usefulness of Bingo Dare in relation to affective domain, and to investigate ESL
students’ opinion on how Bingo Dare can be improved. The findings revealed that the respondents had
positive opinion on the usefulness of Bingo Dare on ESL learning and the usefulness of Bingo Dare
in relation to affective domain. The respondents also believed that the game needed to improve its
content, appearance, and rules. An open-ended question was asked in order to discover their opinion
on the game and four themes that emerged from the thematic analysis were Compliments, Suggestions
to Improve the Game, Benefits, and Others. It can be concluded that despite the usefulness of the game
and the compliments it received, improvements were required especially on its content, appearance,
and rules. Discussions and recommendations for future studies are also included in this paper.
Keywords: Language game, Game-based learning, Gamification, ESL learners

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INTRODUCTION

In the era of the 20th century, it is important for ESL educators to be creative in teaching and learning
sessions. It has been a big challenge for ESL educators to create a learning material in attracting their
ESL learners’ attention. It is important for the learning material to be engaging for the learners to
participate in the lesson activity. Any lesson that requires the participants to engage as active
participants will benefit them in absorbing the knowledge easily (Resnik, 2004).

There are many methods that can be used in order to make a lesson interesting and fun. One of them
is by developing a well-designed game-based activity that motivates learners to persevere and strive
their best. One popular method that can be used is through ‘gamification’ method. Gamification refers
to a gameplay that has clear learning outcomes which stimulate learner’s language, critical thinking
and problem-solving abilities (Wahyuni & Junior, 2018). It is believed that by going through a process
of thinking in playing games, it will be able to attract students’ engagement and promote problems
solving (Zichermann & Cunningham, 2011). Technically gamification incorporates elements that are
normally associated with games- such as competition, teamwork, scoring points, winning and losing,
completing levels and getting prizes in order to increase players engagement (Wahyuni & Junior,
2018). Through this learner-centered pedagogy used in the game- based learning activity, it will
encourage the learner to participate actively with the learning activity.

Game-based learning forms a zone of proximal development through scaffolding and mentoring
techniques. The zone of proximal development is a gap between the actual developmental with the
potential development level as determined by problem-solving ability with adult guidance, or in
collaboration with more capable peers (Vygotsky, 1978). Scaffolding is used in game-based learning
to facilitate the learners to move from one level to another which requires improvement in order to
achieve the ultimate goal. In this context, the teacher will provide scaffolding such as giving advice
or facilitate them and at the same time making the lessons flexible and ready to cater the students’
need in obtaining the engagement (Ghazal & Singh, 2016). The instructional support will be slowly
withdrawn once the students are familiar with the concept and able to solve the problems on their
own.

Another importance of game-based learning is it allows the players to be in a state of flow. According
to Paras and Bizzocchi (2005), the students will experience flow while playing the game when they
are completely involved with the activity. Flow according to Csikszentmihalyi (1975) is a state where
someone is being completely absorbed with the activity up to the point not even external stimulus can
distract your attention. This indicates that the student has high level of intrinsic motivation and is
totally focused on the task which makes him unconsciously progressing from one level to another
(Kurt & Kurt, 2018).

Games that are challenging but provide achievable challenges may capture the learners’ imagination
and keep them engaged for a sustained period (Ghazal & Singh, 2016). The effect of seeing the result
of their actions while playing the game gives them a sense of fulfilment and motivate them to

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participate better without realizing its extensive effects on vocabulary, grammar and other aspects
of language improvement (Ghazal & Singh, 2016).

Interesting games such as Scrabble or simulation-based games motivate learners intrinsically which
is good in fostering competency and efficacy among the players (Ghazal & Singh, 2016). Such games
are attention gatherers that offer enjoyment and enthusiasm to the lesson (Kurt & Kurt, 2018).

Apart from that, communication skill can be enhanced through game-based learning. In a game- based
learning classroom, learners must interact to support others and cooperate to get through a difficult
task. Interactions between players in multiplayer games will develop the players’ social skills and at
the same time develop empathy about the ethics and ethical choices when they are into the game
character (Ghazal & Singh, 2016). A study done by Fung & Min (2016) found that through games,
students were able to enhance their self-confidence and develop their sense of control since less
pressure taken while playing the games which eliminates the anxiety to speak and create positive
learning environment among peers.

With a lot of advantages offered by game-based learning, this study seeks to find answers to three
pertinent questions:
1. What are ESL students’ opinions on the usefulness of Bingo Dare on ESL learning?
2. What are ESL students’ opinions on the usefulness of Bingo Dare in relation to affective
domain?
3. What are the suggestions to improve Bingo Dare?

METHODS
A group of 3 ESL students were given a task to design and create their language game in 3 weeks
while supervised by their lecturer. They decided to adapt the concept from the famous board game,
Monopoly by Hasbro, and created a different set of new rules and tasks that they deemed more
suitable and engaging to ESL learners. After the game had been completed, it was played by their
classmates, 32 ESL learners, in 4 ESL lessons.
After the fourth lesson, the participants were asked to complete a questionnaire to investigate their
opinion on the usefulness of the game, Bingo Dare, and to discover their suggestions on how the
game can be improved. There were 3 main sections in the questionnaire:
1. the usefulness of the game on ESL learning (5 Likert-scale items + 1 checkbox items)
2. the usefulness of the game in relation to affective domain (3 Likert -scale items)
3. suggestions to improve the game (1 checkbox item + 1 open-ended item).

The data collected was analysed by using IBM SPSS Statistics 25 to answer the 3 research questions
and descriptive statistics were used in presenting the findings. All Likert -scale items

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(8 items) were tested with Shapiro-Wilk test of normality and their reliability was tested by using
Cronbach alpha. On the other hand, thematic analysis was utilised for the open -ended item and
the themes that emerged from the analysis were presented with the verbatim comments.
The Rules of the Game
The General Rules:
1. Each group can only consist of 2-5 players
2. Each group must randomly arrange 25 numbers (number 1-25) on their board as they
like
3. Each group must complete the task based on the number that they get from the dice
4. When a group succeeds to complete a task, they can take out any one of the 25
numbers from the board
5. The first group that succeeds to take out 5 numbers in a row from their board wins
the game.
Charades:
1. Each group must take 10 cards
2. 1 group member must hold all the 10 cards without reading the words written on the
card by placing them on his forehead
3. Another group member must describe the words on each card. Hand gestures, body
movements, and sounds are not allowed to be used in describing th e words
4. The group member who holds the card must guess the words written on each card.
5. All 10 cards must be completed in 2 minutes.

Spell Me:
1. Each group must take 10 cards
2. 1 group member must hold all cards and read the words on each card aloud
3. The other group members take turns in spelling the words on each card
4. All 10 cards must be completed in 2 minutes.

Tongue Twister:
1. Each group must take 2 cards
2. All group members must read the tongue twister on each card correctly
3. The task must be completed in 2 minutes.

MAIN RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The main results are presented based on the research questions:

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1. to investigate ESL students’ opinion on the usefulness of Bingo Dare on ESL learning
2. to investigate ESL students’ opinion on the usefulness of Bingo Dare in relation to
affective domain
3. to investigate ESL students’ opinion on how Bingo Dare can be improved.
Test of Normality
Table 1. Shapiro-Wilk Test of Normality

Tests of Normality
Kolmogorov-Smirnova Shapiro-Wilk
Statistic df Sig. Statistic df Sig.
Skills .321 32 .000 .774 32 .000
Fun .358 32 .000 .734 32 .000
Knowledge .308 32 .000 .785 32 .000
Recommend .318 32 .000 .739 32 .000
Play .297 32 .000 .761 32 .000
Motivate .270 32 .000 .786 32 .000
Excited .275 32 .000 .784 32 .000
Confident .244 32 .000 .807 32 .000
a. Lilliefors Significance Correction

The table above shows that the Sig. value of each Likert scale item for the Shapiro -Wilk statistic
was .000, suggesting violation of the assumption of normality (Pallant, 2016). Thus, the median (a
non-parametric statistic) of each Likert scale item was used instead of mean in order to report the
descriptive analysis.

Research Question 1: ESL Students’ Opinion on the Usefulness of Bingo Dare on ESL
Learning
Table 2. Cronbach’s Alpha Reliability Test

Reliability Statistics
Cronbach's
Alpha Based
on
Cronbach's Standardized
Alpha Items N of Items
.791 .793 5

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The table shows that the Cronbach’s Alpha value for the 5 Likert scale items was 0.791 and therefore
the reliability was considered acceptable (Pallant, 2016).

Table 3. Frequencies on the Usefulness of Bingo Dare on ESL Learning

Statistics
Skills Fun Knowledge Recommend Play
N Valid 32 32 32 32 32
Missing 0 0 0 0 0
Median 4.00 4.00 4.00 4.50 4.00
Std. Deviation .619 .568 .641 .619 .660
Percentiles 25 4.00 4.00 4.00 4.00 4.00
50 4.00 4.00 4.00 4.50 4.00
75 4.00 5.00 4.75 5.00 5.00

The table above shows that all 5 Likert scale items in this section were rated positively by the
respondents. They agreed that Bingo Dare helped improve their English language skills (median =
4.00), helped learn English while having fun (median = 4.00), improved knowledge about English
language (median = 4.00), they would recommend the game to other people (median = 4.50), and
they wanted to play the game in their English class (median = 4.00).
The respondents were asked to choose which English language skills they learned from playing Bingo
Dare. They could choose more than 1 skill. The figure below illustrates the findings:

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Figure 1. English Language Skills Learned from Playing Bingo Dare

The figure shows that 93.8% (n = 30) of the respondents chose speaking as one of skills they learned
from playing Bingo Dare. This is followed by listening (87.5%, n= 28), reading (56.3%, n = 18),
grammar (43.8%, n = 14), idioms (15.6%, n = 5), and writing (9.4%, n = 3).

Research Question 2: ESL Students’ Opinion on the Usefulness of Bingo Dare in Relation to
Affective Domain

Table 4. Cronbach’s Alpha Reliability Test

Reliability Statistics
Cronbach's
Alpha Based
on
Cronbach's Standardized
Alpha Items N of Items
.848 .846 3

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The table above shows that the Cronbach’s Alpha for the 3 Likert scale items in this section was
0.848 and therefore the reliability was preferable (Pallant, 2016).

Table 5. Frequencies on the Usefulness of Bingo Dare in Relation to Affective Domain

Statistics
Motivate Excited Confident
N Valid 32 32 32
Missing 0 0 0
Median 4.00 4.00 4.00
Std. Deviation .672 .762 .792
Percentiles 25 4.00 4.00 4.00
50 4.00 4.00 4.00
75 5.00 5.00 5.00

The table above shows that the respondents rated the 3 Likert scale items positively. They agreed that
playing Bingo Dare motivated them to use English (median = 4.00), made them excited to learn
English (median = 4.00), and made them became more confident to use English (median = 4.00).

Research Question 3: ESL Students’ Opinion on How Bingo Dare can be Improved
The respondents were requested to provide their suggestions and opinion to improve Bingo Dare.
They were asked to choose which part of the game needed improvement and the open-ended question
asked their comments on the game.

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Figure 2. Parts of Bingo Dare that Needed to be Improved

The figure shows that 46.9% (n = 15) of the respondents thought that Bingo Dare needed to improve
its content. Other than that, 43.8% (n = 14) of the respondents believed that the game’s appearance
had to be improved and 40.6% (n = 13) of the respondents believed that the game had to improve its
rules.
The open-ended question revealed the respondents’ opinion on Bingo Dare. The data was analysed
by using thematic analysis and the themes emerged from the analysis were as follows:

Table 6. Comments on Bingo Dare

Themes Comments
Compliments “Interesting game!”
“I love this game!”
“Its good and promising”
“I LOVE THE GAME”
“i love this game so much”
“This game is awesome..”
“gg”
“good game”
“Wowerz”

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“Great game!”
“Good”
Suggestions to Improve “Improve the rules of the game”
The Game “Would be better if everyone could understand the rules of
the game”
“All member need to know the rules of the game, so it not
waste time for the player. Thank you”
“need improvement”
“Make it more hype”
“make the game more easier to understand and the design”
“They need to improve their content with variety types of
task.”
“Make it nice to attrack other people to play the game”
“More creativity”
“Add on some rules”
“the rule need to be more detailed”
“Need inprovement”

Benefits “This game is exciting”

“Thanks for the knowledge”
“The game is fun”
“This game must be fun if it will be held in the class”

Others “Overall its okay”

“do the best”

The comments were reported exactly as written (verbatim) by the respondents. It is important to
highlight that a lot of comments on the theme Suggestions to Improve The Game were focusing on
the rules of the game. Thus, it is crucial that the game developers improve this part of the game.
However, the other 2 themes emerged from the analysis were Compliments and Benefits. The
respondents complimented the game by stating that it was a good game and they loved the game.
Moreover, the game was also described as exciting, fun and it also provided knowledge to the
respondents. For the last theme, Others, the participants encouraged the game developers to do their
best and stated that the game was okay.

CONCLUSION
In this study, ESL learners’ opinion on a board game was explored by using a set of questionnaires.
The data obtained from the first section of the questionnaire found that the respondents provided
positive ratings on the usefulness of the board game, Bingo Dare, on ESL learning. Also, the data
obtained from the second section of the questionnaire found that the respondents provided positive

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ratings on the usefulness of Bingo Dare in relation to affective domain. However, the data from the
third section of the questionnaire found that Bingo Dare needed to improve its contents, appearance,
and rules despite the benefits it gave to the respondents and the compliments it received.
Interestingly, the results suggested that an ESL board game designed by ESL students themselves had
the potential to become a beneficial game suitable for ESL learning given that all the weaknesses had
to be improved. Adding new contents and amending the game’s rules may be more challenging to be
achieved by the game developers, but the lecturer can continue facilitating them in this regard. The
game developers probably had limited time to refine the board game in 3 weeks and thus more time
is required to amend the product.
The findings of this study provided positive insights from the students’ point of view regarding the
usage of ESL games in ESL lessons. Playing games can send the students into a state of flow where
they are completely absorbed in the activity that not even external stimulus can distract them
(Csikszentmihalyi, 1975) and this focus enables them to unconsciously progress from one level to
another level of the learning process (Kurt & Kurt, 2018) with the instructor acting as a facilitator
(Vygotsky, 1978) and the students actively engaged in the learning process (Resnik, 2004). In this
study, a majority of the respondents believed that they learned speaking and listening skills while
playing the game. Similarly, previous studies also found that playing games helped students eliminate
their speaking anxiety (Fung & Min, 2016) and improve communication and social skills (Ghazal &
Singh, 2016). This may be due to the fact that a language game can motivate the students to participate
better in the learning process without realizing its effects on language improvement aspects (Ghazal
& Singh, 2016).
In conclusion, the results of this study indicate that a board game can be useful in the process of
learning a second language in the classroom. Future research should explore whether this kind of
board game gives a significant difference to ESL learners’ language skills or not, and how can
developing a board game for language learning help ESL learners improve their language skills.

REFERENCES
Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1975). Beyond boredom and anxiety. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Fung, Y. M., & Min, Y. L. (2016). Effects of board game on speaking ability of low-proficiency ESL
learners. International Journal of Applied Linguistics and English Literature, 5(3), 261-
271.http://journals.aiac.org.au/index.php/IJALEL/article/viewFile/2289/2004

Ghazal & Singh (2016). Game-Based Language Learning: Activities for ESL Classes with Limited Access to
Technology. ELT Voices, 6 (4), 1-8.http://eltvoices.in/Volume6/Issue_4/EVI_64_1.pdf

Kurt, P. Y., & Kurt, H. (2018). Instructional Practices that Motivate Students to Learn English. JOURNAL
OF EDUCATION AND FUTURE-EGITIM VE GELECEK DERGISI, (14), 119-
130.http://dergipark.gov.tr/download/article-file/542033

Pallant, J. (2016). SPSS Survival Guide Manual 6th edition. Two Penn Plaza.

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Paras, B., & Bizzocchi, J. (2005). Game, motivation, and effective learning: an integrated model for
educational game design. Proceedings of DiGRA 2005 Conference: Changing Views – Worlds in Play.

Resnik, M. (2004). Edutainment? No Thanks. I Prefer Playful Learning. MIT Media Laboratory. Retrieved
February27, 2014, from https://llk.media.mit.edu/papers/archive/edutainment.pdf

Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in Society. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Wahyuni, S., & Junior, E. G. (2018). Gamification in English Language Teaching: Taboo and Timeline. The
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Zichermann, G., & Cunningham, C. (2011). Gamification by Design; Implementing Game Mechanics in Web
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Biodata
Siti Aishah Taib is an Academy of Language Studies lecturer at UiTM Cawangan Johor Kampus Pasir Gudang.
She teaches ELC codes to undergraduate students. Her research interests include innovation in the teaching
and learning of ESL, e-learning, and MOOC.

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