E-snakes and ladders: a hypermedia educational environment for portable devices

This paper presents e-Snakes and Ladders (e-S&L), a game-based educational environment for portable devices. The e-S&L is based on the classic table game “Snakes and Ladders” and enriches the table game with various types of activities like Questions&Answers and Web-Quests. It provides a pleasant e-learning environment with an easy to use authoring tool for the instructor. The e-S&L is based on communication services and protocols (e.g., email, SMS, MMS, HTTP, FTP) and on context-aware technologies. It supports learning standards such as: QTI, IMS LIP, e-portfolio, Dublin Core metadata creation and WebQuest. Further, the paper presents a learning scenario, authored for demonstrating the e-S&L characteristics. The findings from this study offer interesting insights into the extent to which computer gaming might be employed as a tool for supporting learning.