In this study 116 pre-service, internship year, and in-service teachers in a large Midwestern university in the USA responded to a survey asking about their current experience, attitudes, self-efficacy, and perceived challenges and barriers to the implementation of digital game-based learning (DGBL) in the classroom. The 33-item survey instrument distinguished four genres of educational digital games: Edutainment games and educational applications, serious games, simulation and multiplayer online games, and educational game design tools. And the design of these four genres of games was associated with four contemporary learning theories/teaching philosophies, behaviorism, cognitive constructivism, social constructivism, and constructionism. Findings show that a majority of teachers were light game players whose gaming activities were mobile-centric. These teachers were overall affirmative about the likelihood of integrating games for instruction and they favored the use of Edutainment games and educational applications based on pre-existing familiarity, comfortableness and ease of use. Findings also showed that there is a mismatch between teachers’ teaching philosophy and their preferred game genre for instruction. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to extrapolate a set of five barriers that impede with teachers’ use of games. The five barriers were mismatch between DGBL and standardized curriculum, administrative and parental negative perceptions, lack of technology support and preparation in teacher preparation and professional support, short class periods, and low quality of educational digital games. A typology is proposed as an analytic framework for studying teachers’ fundamental understanding of educational digital games and for guiding teachers to utilize informed pedagogical practices incorporating DGBL in the classroom. Future research on using games for education needs to investigate how teachers’ philosophy of teaching could potentially impact their choices of games and affect effective implementation of DGBL.
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