International Game Developers Association

EDTEC 670: Exploratory Learning Through Educational Simulation & Games

Games Education
Course

Contents 1 Teachers 1.1 Instructors 2 Course Background Information 2.1 Location 2.2 Classification 2.3 Time periods 3 Course Structure 3.1 Course description 3.2 Course learning objectives 3.3 Week by week topics 4 Course Materials & Facilities Used 5 Analysis of learning methods 5.1 What worked 5.2 What didn't work

Teachers

Instructors

• Bernie Dodge

Course Background Information

Location

San Diego State University

Classification

See: Areas for classifing for your course.

'Primary classification: Game Design

Time periods

Class meets for 15 weeks.

Course Structure

Course description

This course deals with aspects of the design process that are sometimes neglected. To design an instructional game well, you must be both systematic and intuitive, analytic and artistic. In mastering the ISD process, you've learned to handle the cognitive side of instruction (which, almost by definition, is the most important). In EDTEC 670, you'll also learn to deal with the affective side of instruction. Throughout the course we'll be addressing the questions: What makes some activities interesting or fun? How can we maximize enjoyment without sacrificing instructional quality? It's a difficult and fascinating challenge for any instructional designer.

A second major theme of the course involves the design of simulations. The questions that will dominate the second half of the course are these: How do we represent reality in a simulation? How do we balance simplicity, efficiency, and playability against realism, richness and complexity? These, too, are challenging design tasks

Course learning objectives

Upon completing this course, students will be able to:

1. Analyze a given educational game or simulation platform and explain the range of learning applications for which it might be effective.
2. Decide what type of game or simulation (if any) would be an appropriate medium of instruction, given a set of objectives and a description of a learner group and context.
3. Use, where appropriate, selected psychological theories and models to describe motivational and affective aspects of instruction. The models will include the following: Csikszentmihalyi's flow model; Keller's ARCS model; Malone & Lepper's intrinsic motivation taxonomy.
4. Describe and explain selected issues, people, concepts and principles involved in the design of educational simulations and games using a group weblog as the medium of communication.
5. Design an educational board game that is flexible and effective and document its rules, physical attributes, context of use, rationale, and variations.
6. Design and document a computer-based educational simulation-game, using flowcharts, maps, and equations as appropriate as well as the motivational principles at work in the design.
7. Reflect on and explain the design processes you use in creating motivating educational products.

Week by week topics

1. Course Overview and Introduction, Card and Board Games for Education and Training
2. Designing Your Own Board Game, Introducing Blogger
3. Board Design II, Team Formation
4. Board Design III, Work Session
5. Theories of Intrinsic Motivation, Analyzing Boredom & Interest
6. Board Game Exhibition
7. Introduction to Inform 7 (virtual)
8. Introduction to Second Life
9. Introduction to Star Logo 2, eGame Project Selection
10. eGame Group Work Session
11. eGame meetings (no class)
12. eGame Group Work Session
13. The Glass Bead Game, eGame work session
14. eGame Peer Feedback & Research Work Session
15. eGame Presentation

Course Materials & Facilities Used

Books

• Fullerton, T, Swain, C., & Hoffman, S . (2004). Game Design Workshop: Designing, Prototyping and Playtesting Games. San Francisco, CA: CMP Books. (required)
• August/September 2005 issue of Innovate, Journal of Online Education.
• Barab, S., & Roth, W. (2006) Curriculum-based Ecosystems: Supporting Knowing from an Ecological Perspective.

Software (engines, tools)

The final deliverable for your egame project will be primarily a design document, not a working game. To test your interface ideas and illustrate your design, though, you will learn to use specialized software tools and, depending on the project you choose, learn to work within the strengths and limitations of one tool. The three platforms we'll be using this semester are:

• Second Life, a massively multiplayer virtual world;
• Star Logo, a free authoring language used to create simulations of self-organizing systems; and
• Inform 7, a freeware interactive fiction development environment.

All project documentation will be presented in the form of web pages and shared via the course web site.

Assessment materials

Your final grade will be determined by your performance on a board game design, your contributions to several discussion topics, and an e-game analysis and design document and prototype.

There will be several e-game project opportunities to choose from. Each will involve the development of a computer-based prototype and a written analysis of its design from both instructional and motivational vantage points.

Discussion contributions will be graded individually. All projects will be team efforts. Each individual on the team will be graded separately, though the overall performance of the team will have an influence over individual grades. It behooves you, therefore, to put some energy into team building in order to maximize everyone's success. The projects will be weighted as follows:

• Board Game 25%
• Game Development Discussion 20%
• EdGameBlog Contributions 10%
• eGame Analysis 15%
• eGame Design 30%

This is a graduate level course.

Analysis of learning methods

What worked

Please discuss what techniques worked well

What didn't work

Please discuss what techniques didn’t work as well as you had hoped

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