Game Changers: Designing an Open Games Design Programme

This week, during a brainstorming session in the DMLL with my good friend and colleague Kate Green, we sat down on a couple of bean bags in our lab and started to try and imagine what an open games design programme might look like. We both wanted to get stuck into developing an open online programme, with its foundations built on openness (obviously), community, and a strong sharing ethos. We had the seed of an idea in the form of a design sprint and open course mash-up, now it was time to develop this into a full programme.

I’d been noodling around an idea to use the lab’s large ‘café’ space for some kind of extended workshop/sprint session, but had been waiting for the right project to come along that might warrant such a setup. If we were going to host a large-scale practical workshop, over say five days, we’d need to ensure that we had a theme worth investing in. One with enough participants to make a workshop sustainable over a number of days.

Kate and I had been eager to develop a new open class, one that we would have the freedom to design from the ground up, especially considering there are no other open classes like it currently running at Coventry University. Then a potential opportunity presented itself in the form of an ongoing conversation between Sylvester Arnab (Reader in Games Science) and Helen Keegan (DMLL Principal Project Lead), who had been discussing the idea of establishing some kind of gamification project in the lab.

The project in question would focus on a series of videos presented by a collection of engaging characters, such as ‘Dr. Game’, who would explain a variety of game design concepts for anyone interested in designing their own games or gamifying an activity. The videos would form part of a wider, non-linear collection of design resources. The materials would be quite ‘meta’ and abstract in nature, relying more on viral dissemination over a more traditional course-based delivery.

So there was the potential to establish a programme around Sylvester and Helen’s initial conversations. This seemed like the perfect starting point to work from, something we could adapt to form a strong foundation for an open programme.

Jumping back to this week’s bean bags and brainstorming, we combined the themes of educational game design, an open course framework, an open community, and a practical prototyping workshop. Using these we started to build a narrative that would run through our programme.

Skills sharing and matchmaking were two important areas we wanted to focus on,

established the foundations of an open game design programme, culminating in a 5 day ‘game sprint’. Perfect!

We had the bones of a potentially great project, now all we needed to do was flesh it out…

Game Changers: A Change of Direction

Over the past few days, our Game Changers team came to realise that the programme we had spent so long creating had a frustrating flaw. It all boiled down to one simple problem: we were building a voluntary programme that revolved around a fixed timeline, which meant relying on a huge investment of time from both staff and participants. Participants who have a million and one other things to do, such as mandatory coursework, full-time jobs, busy social lives, and other extra-curricular activities. Many of these activities are not flexible by nature, making it hard for participants to fit the Game Changers programme into their schedules.

This, in hindsight, is the completely wrong way to approach things. It should be Game Changers that is flexible, not the other way around. When we started the programme we quickly began to realise that our fixed timeline was preventing participants from investing their time. When you know you simply won’t be able to take part in something that requires regular engagement outside of your existing workload, it’s best not to take on something your can’t guarantee you can complete in the time required. Interest in the programme was high, but actual conversion into participation was low.

With this in mind we have decided to scrap the fixed timeline of activities altogether. Now, anyone who wishes to take part can do so at their leisure, in a completely independent and non-linear way. Instead of supporting a strict six-week programme, we will instead hold Game Changers events, run workshops, develop resources, and provide support for projects linked with the Game Changers moving forward.

It’s a different direction than we had initially envisioned, but the more we discussed the new direction the more practical and flexible it proved to be. What’s more, we’re no longer limited to focusing on one stage at a time, opening up our support to whichever stage Game Changers participants are currently undertaking. Happy days!

We’ve already got some great GC supported projects on the horizon and I’m looking forward to posting about them soon 😉

Playful Learning - short video clip of closing speech by Marjaana Kangas at #Thrive19 conference

https://makertube.net/w/ixppHy6mHSEAQaSiJcNESi

🚀 Last week, Kathi and Senad had the pleasure and honor of holding a workshop on gamification at the Media Lab Bayern Innovation Festival!

The 3 key takeaways:

🎯Gamification & Serious Games are booming - Our workshop was fully booked with 30+ participants, and the interest in game-based learning is huge.

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Read more below
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#Gamification #SeriousGames #PlayfulLearning #InnovationFestival

🌟 Munchkinss Preschool – A world of learning and fun! A place where kids can learn through play, make lasting friendships, and explore new things every day. Our fun-filled activities help children grow, discover, and develop in a happy and safe environment. Let’s make learning an exciting adventure together!

#MunchkinsPreschool #littlelearners #learningthroughplay #letthemplay #growingkids #playandlearn #earlychildhoodeducation #kidsatplay #playfullearning

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DBdFB3nK2mt/?igsh=MTl2aXl6OGx6dm8yYg==

Blog Post:
The PlayLab Bus Project: A Journey in Frugal Education Innovation in Malaysia

#FrugalEducation #PlayfulLearning #Education #Sustainability #Research #GChangers #Malaysia

https://frugal.education/the-playlab-bus-project/

Blog Post: A Conversation on Frugal Education: Insights from my AACE Review Interview.

https://frugal.education/frugal-education-interview-aace-review/

#FrugalEducation #PlayfulLearning #GBL #Research #EducationDesign #SustainableEducation #Education

Language teachers, join me for a FREE online event w/ Niigata JALT: Games, Play, Language & Teaching!

Explore playful learning & discover game-based methods. Sign up: https://t.co/ftIOLYgPlY
⏰March 10th 9am JST
#JALT #GamesAndLanguage #PlayfulLearning #LudicLanguagePedagogy

Ny udgivelse.

Om at indfange et komplekst fænomen kvantitativt: - med Playful Learning | CEPRA-striben
Af Jeppe Bundsgaard, Bent Sortkær, Mona Have

#skolechat #playfullearning

https://journals.ucn.dk/index.php/cepra/article/view/542

[PODCAST] Gamification vs. Game-Based Learning: What's up? w/ Dr. James York & Dr. Jonathan deHaan (Ludic Language Pedagogy)

https://pca.st/episode/a7502b78-cf67-4bd0-916e-27b84863881a

#pedagogy #create2learn #PlayingWithMedia #PlayfulLearning #teaching