Game 101 with Jeffrey Kuhn

I had a blast learning from Jeffrey in this presentation.Thanks ever so much @TVeigga for sharing that video I had been looking for. http://media.rededosaber.sp.gov.br/see/LEM_16_07_15.wmv

The link to RELOBrazil FB page: https://www.facebook.com/relobrazil/photos/a.143136705734049.25560.142164889164564/878188362228876/?type=1&theater

Previous link not working. So video not playing here. But here is a link where you can watch. http://www.rededosaber.sp.gov.br/portais/Not%C3%ADciasConte%C3%BAdo/tabid/369/language/pt-BR//IDNoticia/1751/Default.aspx

My PLN knows that I’ve been playing/reflecting with the concept of fun and class games/activities for couple of years now. In this presentation, Jeffrey Kuhn gives us tools that will take board games (or any other game) to another level of engagement and interaction. Interestly, about couple of months ago, I asked 3 groups of learners who were all boys and video game players to design a game in which the objective was to check if players understood the comic book story they had read.

They had total freedom to discuss and design it the way they wanted it. I intervine only by asking questions and trying to understand where they were going with their ideas. In all 3 groups, they thought of fun to play first. Then we discussed objective and content, the concept of playability and how that would be achieved taking into consideration the content and objective. In order to be able to win, the players would obviously need to read the story and make sure they understood it. They are very competitive learners and their primary interest is not in the content, but the experience they get through playing. After all, some games they play do have a story to tell, but it isn’t as predictable as the games they were designing. I wonder though if by having a clear content and objective in mind, it had put constraints on their ability to come up with a more creative and fun game. #doubt

One thing Jeffrey addresses in his presentation that reminded of this experience is the fact that designers draw ideas from other games. That’s exactly what happened with one of the groups (3 students). We had playerd earlier this year a game-like activity (running dictation) where instead of giving them the dialogue, I printed the lines of the characters, cut them and stuck the lines around a second room next to ours in a random order and all kind of places (on the desk, board, wall, window, etc.). If there were enough students, I’d make them play in pairs. In this case, only 3 students so they played by themselves against each other. In one room they had a sheet of paper. They would run to the other room, choose a line, turn it upside down so no one would try to write the same sentence, go back to the first room and write it down from memory. Depends on the length of the sentence, they would go back more times. Once they were finished, they would call me (the referee) to check the sentence and if correct they would run take that slip of paper with the line they had just written and choose a new one. The activity ended as soon as there were no more lines to be read and copied. The winner was the one who collected most of the lines.

Every group experienced that game-like activity, but only the 3 students above chose that as a base for their game. They told me later, they were inspired by that experience which they enjoyed a lot. I’ll share more as soon as I get the data I collected from these classes together. That was my first experience in sharing the floor with them to design/create something and I have so much to write about it and reflect but… so little time. Until next time then!