Simulations are a valuable tool to help students understand and apply financial and economic concepts in a safe and controlled environment. Today, many colleges and universities are incorporating simulations into their financial and economic education programs to enhance students' understanding and decision-making skills.
According to a study published in the social science-focused journal Social Prisma #25, all these multiplicity of perspectives lead to the same issue: that games, simulations and virtual worlds can be an indispensable tool in the teaching repertoire and not just a cosmetic addition to traditional methodologies, as it might seem at first, but because of their novel characteristics, which have the potential to support new teaching methods as long as their limitations are taken into account and they are conceived as practical experiences within experimental environments controlled by the indispensable supervision of the teacher.
One of the main advantages of simulations is that they allow students to experience and learn in a safe way, without having to assume the real risks of financial decisions. For example, in a stock market simulation, students can learn how to invest in stocks and see how their decisions affect their virtual portfolio. In this way, they can better understand how market fluctuations affect their investments and how they can diversify their portfolio to minimize risk.
In addition, the simulations can be customized and tailored to specific teaching objectives. Teachers can select scenarios that best suit their teaching objectives and control the level of difficulty to ensure that students are challenged but not overwhelmed.
According to a 2012 research it was concluded that several studies have reported that educational computer games can enhance students' learning interest (Ebner and Holzinger 2007; Malone 1980), and even increase their motivation (Burguillo, 2010; Liu and Chu 2010; Dickey 2010; Harris and Reid 2005; Papastergiou 2009 ; Tüzün et al. 2009).
Simulations can also be used to teach practical skills, such as data analysis, problem solving and decision making. By using simulations, students can develop skills that will be useful in their professional lives by allowing them to experiment with situations that resemble those they will face in the real world. This is consistent with the research mentioned above, as compared to traditional teaching, educational computer games can provide a more interesting learning environment for acquiring knowledge (Cagiltay 2007).
In other words, simulations are a very effective pedagogical tool, as they allow students to learn at their own pace and in their own environment. This is especially important for students who have difficulties understanding financial and economic concepts in a traditional way. Which according to the mentioned researchs are valuable tools to help students understand and apply different concepts. By allowing them to experiment and learn safely, without having to assume the real risks of decisions, simulations are helping students make more informed and effective decisions.
Although personalized educational computer games (or simulations) have shown significant effectiveness in improving the learning performance of participants, more experiments are needed to extend the findings in different academic settings. In addition, to provide a more effective learning environment for individual learners, additional factors related to personalization (eg, prior knowledge, online learning behaviors, and beliefs about online learning) must be taken into account.
That is why from Eureka Simulations we invite you to continue transforming education, testing our educational simulations and verifying the results from your own experience, thus creating practical, modern learning environments capable of exceeding all the expectations of your students.
Sources:
Martínez, D. A., & Ostúa, P. N. (2019). Juegos y simulaciones en la educación actual. Prisma Social: revista de investigación social, (25), 537-548.
Marchori, E. J. (2012). Contribuciones a la autoría de juegos y simulaciones educativas basadas en un enfoque multidisciplinar.
