Class for Educators and Trainers: Designing Creative Learning Activities and Games

ClassRiverCrabs3I’m trying to see if there’s enough interest out there for me to offer an online playful activity and game design course for college and high school teachers.

If you're an interested educator, join my contact list and I'll write you when I find a way to do it. If you're an interested sponsor, or school that can host the class online, contact me directly below. In the meanwhile, here's what I'm thinking of:

First of all, when I say “game design,” I don’t mean video games. I mean designing our own simple board, card, and discussion games to implement in our non-digital classroom. We’ll do this by studying a powerful pedagogy called game-based learning, which examines the learning principles in games, and shows us how to apply them to our exercises, all with the noble goal of increasing student engagement and performance.

alphaplaytestA bit about me: I travel all over the country to present workshops at colleges and conferences on precisely this topic—that’s how strongly I believe in this pedagogy. (I even designed a game to do this called What’s Your Game Plan?). I like to give interactive demonstrations and game models that are immediately applicable to any instructional method. In my classes, you won’t be bored by overly theoretical, semiotic discussions of terms like “emergent play” and “discernable actions”; my sole teaching purpose is to show you the practical nature of game design.

To allow for full participation, our cap should be 50 student-educators. It will be a very social class, with everyone chiming in weekly with our unique discipline perspectives on teaching students. We may be able to meet each other face-to-face at the CUNY Games Conference (http://cunygames.org), though this is optional. There’s no pressure to finish all of the assignments; just do what you can. You also needn’t be worried about your lack of game knowledge; game mechanics are simply our inspiration. The course is more for teachers who find it intriguing to create educational exercises that are as clever as possible. If you are a workforce trainer and not a teacher, I am also trying to create a separate class for you too.

Sounds good? Then please join my announcement-only email list, which you can unsubscribe from anytime. This is not a commitment to register for the class, but it’s the only way I can contact you.

LIKELY SPECIFICATIONS

Length and Time: Probably 4-6 weeks. Offered either in the summer, or October through November.

Format: Fully online course; probably not for credit; less than 50 students. We would likely access the course through a unique achievement-based learning management software of my design called Levelfly.

Participants: Teachers and instructional designers at the high school and college level only; based anywhere in the world; all communication must be in English.

Instructors: Mostly taught by me, but I may recruit my fellow directors of the City University of New York (CUNY) Games Network, a group that connects educators from all disciplines who are interested in games, simulations, and other forms of interactive teaching. See https://games.commons.gc.cuny.edu .

Workload: A little less than a 3 hour-per-week graduate class. But you can do as much as you like.

Cost: I'm aiming for less than $200.

Take-away and Certificate: You will complete (or almost complete) the design of at least one non-digital game that you can teach by yourself. You will finish idea outlines for many other games, based upon a rigorous schema of principles and mechanics. You will identify opportunities for future collaboration with your fellow faculty-students. Finally, since the CUNY Games Network has seen that more and more school administrators are recognizing the value of their faculty receiving professional development training, we are offering a special certificate, signed by us, to all participants who complete 100% of the course content.

SPONSORS

I’m also looking for sponsors, particularly foundations and publishers, who would help me to offer this class for free. I estimate I’d need about $15,000. Or schools that would like to offer such a course. Potential sponsors and schools should write me directly at:

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SAMPLE LESSON UNITS

*Several units on using game learning principles and mechanics to create our own educational learning activities and games

*Unit on collecting data and assessment of your new playful activities and games

*Unit on using badges and experience point systems to reward student behaviors

*Unit on using easy software tools to build or organize your creative activities or games (MS-Word, Powerpoint)

*Unit on using game mechanics to promote information literacy and research skills

*Unit on using game-based learning for your own professional development (publishing, conferences, etc.)