Game-making for learning
I study how game making can function as a learning method rather than only an output format, especially when learners design systems, rules, and feedback as part of understanding a concept.
Research
Research
My research examines how curriculum, learning technologies, school leadership, and motivational design can be translated into more usable systems for teachers and learners.
Research
My research examines how curriculum, learning technologies, school leadership, and motivational design can be translated into more usable systems for teachers and learners.
Systems thinking and curriculum design
I am interested in how curriculum can support systems thinking by helping learners trace relationships, feedback loops, and consequences across connected parts of a problem or environment.
Motivation, engagement, and participation
My work treats motivation as something shaped by pacing, challenge, feedback, and meaningful participation rather than as a fixed internal trait.
AI and educational design
I am also exploring how artificial intelligence can improve educational design in ways that are genuinely useful, pedagogically grounded, and attentive to learner experience.
Presentations
- Content Analysis of Motivational Design in Mathematics Curricula: A Study of Ontario and China — The 2nd Chinese Society of Education Annual Conference (2024)
- Content Analysis of Motivational Design in Mathematics Curricula: A Study of Ontario and China — Robert Macmillan Symposium, Western University (2024)
Ongoing work
- MA thesis: Learning Game Making vs. Learning Through Game Making — a systematic review of game making for learning curriculum for developing systems thinking.
- Preprint: Diagnosing Appraisal Practice in Systematic Reviews of Educational Interventions: A Methodological Review with a Draft Proposal for EIAT 2026.
- Manuscript under review: Layered Principalship: Role Boundaries, Teacher Relations, and Accountability in Chinese School Leadership Policy.
- Manuscript under review: Systems Before Code: A Goal-to-Milestone Framework for AI-Supported Creative Programming in K-12.
- Manuscript under review: Have We Solved Them Yet? A Historical Analysis of Recurring Problem Constructions in Seminal Learning Design and Technology Literature.
- Manuscript under review: Cultivating Systems Thinking through Game-Making: A Systematic Review on Curriculum Design.
- Manuscript under review: Meaning & Purpose, Curiosity & Exploration: Motivational Rhetorics in China and Ontario Math Curricula.
Diagnosing Appraisal Practice in Systematic Reviews of Educational Interventions: A Methodological Review with a Draft Proposal for EIAT 2026
EdArXiv · 2026
A methodological review of how systematic reviews of educational interventions appraise study quality, with a draft proposal for an appraisal tool designed for education research contexts.
Layered Principalship: Role Boundaries, Teacher Relations, and Accountability in Chinese School Leadership Policy
Manuscript under review · 2026
A policy analysis of Chinese school leadership that examines how multiple principal roles are assigned in policy and how those roles shape teacher relations, administrative responsibility, and school governance.
Systems Before Code: A Goal-to-Milestone Framework for AI-Supported Creative Programming in K-12
Manuscript under review · 2026
A framework paper proposing a systems-before-code scaffold that helps K-12 students clarify goals, break ideas into milestones, and then move into AI-supported creative programming.
Have We Solved Them Yet? A Historical Analysis of Recurring Problem Constructions in Seminal Learning Design and Technology Literature
Manuscript under review · 2026
A historical analysis of recurring problem constructions in seminal learning design and technology literature, asking whether the field has solved the core problems it has long named.
Cultivating Systems Thinking through Game-Making: A Systematic Review on Curriculum Design
Manuscript under review · 2025
A systematic review of how game-making curricula can cultivate systems thinking through curriculum goals, learning tasks, design processes, and assessment practices.
Meaning & Purpose, Curiosity & Exploration: Motivational Rhetorics in China and Ontario Math Curricula
Manuscript under review · 2025
A comparative curriculum study of how China and Ontario use meaning, purpose, curiosity, and exploration to explain why students should learn mathematics.
Evaluation of Artificial Intelligence Tutoring System Based on the Octalysis Framework: Improving Motivational Design and Management within the System
International Conference on Gamified Learning · 2020
Uses the Octalysis gamification framework to evaluate an AI tutoring system and examine how stronger motivational design can improve learner engagement and system management.