Andrea,
I believe that gamification in education has been around in some form or another for decades. As an elementary student in the mid to late '70s, I remember teachers putting up charts with each of our names in the classroom, and adding different colored stars by our name for each achievement we reached our activity we completed. As students, we perceived this as a contest, constantly competing to be the student who had the most stars at the end of the week. At specific completion of "levels", the teacher would reward students with prizes, like stickers, candy, special pencils, etc. If we as an entire class reached a predetermined target, we all got a more special prize. This motivated us and created an environment of healthy competition. I think the difference now is that the instructional strategy of gamification is more clearly defined and tends to be touted as innovative in terms of the way that technology platforms are being implemented in the classroom. Did anyone else have experiences similar to this?