Gamification in child assessment: A systematic review of culturally responsive assessment practices in low-resource contexts

Beatrice Matafwali

doi:10.51867/scimundi.5.2.42

Autores

Beatrice Matafwali Department of Educational Psychology, Sociology and Special Education University of Zambia https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2028-180X

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.51867/scimundi.5.2.42

Palavras-chave:

Culturally Responsive Assessment, Early Childhood Assessment, Gamification, Indigenous Games, Low-Resource Contexts, Play-Based Assessment, PRISMA

Resumo

Assessment in early childhood informs educational planning, developmental support, and intervention decisions; however, conventional assessment practices can under-represent the competencies of children in culturally diverse, multilingual, Indigenous, and low-resource contexts. Grounded in sociocultural theory and play theory, this PRISMA-guided systematic review synthesises DOI-verifiable journal evidence on gamification, play-based assessment, indigenous games, and culturally responsive assessment for children in early childhood and early primary settings. Searches were structured around ERIC, Google Scholar, Scopus-indexed publisher records, ScienceDirect, SpringerLink, Taylor & Francis, Frontiers, MDPI, PLOS, and African open-access journal platforms, with DOI verification applied as a final authenticity filter. The synthesis indicates that culturally responsive gamified assessment can improve engagement, reduce assessment anxiety, and enable more authentic demonstrations of cognitive, language, numeracy, executive-function, motor, and socio-emotional competencies. Evidence from instruments and practices such as the Malawi Developmental Assessment Tool, the Kilifi Developmental Inventory, the International Development and Early Learning Assessment, play-based assessment batteries, and indigenous-game classroom practices suggests that culturally meaningful assessment contexts can be both psychometrically defensible and ecologically valid. Nevertheless, the literature remains limited by few longitudinal studies, uneven psychometric validation of indigenous game-based assessments, and limited evidence from Zambia and other African low-resource settings. The review recommends the development of locally validated, culturally responsive child assessment tools that integrate indigenous games, storytelling, local languages, movement, and locally available materials while retaining rigorous reliability, validity, and fairness standards.

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