A Guide To Designing Curricular Games

This book is a guide to designing curricular games to suit the needs of students. It makes connections between video games and time-tested pedagogical techniques such as discovery learning and feedback to improve student engagement and learning. It also examines the social nature of gaming such as techniques for driver/navigator partners, small groups, and whole class structures to help make thinking visible; it expands the traditional design process teachers engage in by encouraging use of video game design techniques such as playtesting. The author emphasizes designing curricular games for problem-solving and warns against designing games that are simply “Alex Trebek (host of Jeopardy) wearing a mask”. By drawing on multiple fields such as systems thinking, design theory, assessment, and curriculum design, this book relies on theory to generate techniques for practice.

EveryÊeducator’s imaginative instincts will be guided by this bookÕs practical designÊmethod, which harnesses the power of play for student learning. Teachers from all disciplines and levels can create a full spectrum of engaging exercises through the authors’ six accessible ALLURE steps: Ask where to apply the play. List the mental moves. Link the mental moves to the play. Understand how the learning principles operate. Run the activity-game. Evaluate the learner experience. Along with principles from game-based learning pedagogy, readers will explore a framework of original complex mechanic teaching templates, which will help their fledgling instructional activities cross the bridge into fully formed games. Beginners and veterans will find multiple entry points, from adding a single playful element (student roles to discussions) to more elaborate designs (riddles and simulations). They will also learn different levels of producing physical tabletop components (cards, boards, plastic pieces) or light digital options (discussion board riddles, Google Slides games). Born from the authors’ extensive experiences running professional development workshops, this guide has been frequently requested by teachers at the secondary school and college levels, librarians, instructional designers, and others caught by the allure of educational games and play. Book Features: Offers hands-on, practical advice about how to be more playful with your students, with a focus on nondigital activities and games.Written in the language of instructional design, so advanced knowledge about games or technology is not required.Provides creative instructional techniques that will boost student engagement for both in-person and online instruction.Includes more than two dozen original illustrations and designs to aid understanding. Addresses the need for accessible, inclusive learning environments.

Until now, most teachers have lacked the resources and knowledge to create games that meet their needs. This book presents five principles that can be embedded into traditional or online learning and teaching to enhance engagement and interactivity.

Gaming technologies have become effective learning tools within education. Gamification has the potential to increase engagement using real-time feedback on learning activities, which allows students to reflect on their completion and retention of a learned activity. Gaming Innovations in Higher Education: Emerging Research and Opportunities is an essential reference work featuring the latest scholarly knowledge on the application of different gaming techniques within education to make learning activities more enjoyable and successful. Including research on a number of topics such as virtual laboratories, interaction media, and intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, this publication is ideally designed for academicians, researchers, and students interested in the benefits of providing an entertaining and intellectually-stimulating learning environment.

The volume focuses on epistemological, theoretical and empirical issues of game-based learning in various disciplines. It encompasses questions of game design as well as instructional integration and organizational implementation of game-based learning across various disciplines and includes contributions from different levels of the formal educational system (i.e., primary, secondary and tertiary education) as well as contributions reporting the use of game-based learning in informal learning settings. The volume addresses scholars, practitioners and students who are interested in how games and game-based learning can be designed, implemented and evaluated in a cross-, inter- and transdisciplinary perspective.

How can a group be empowered to improve their ability to make decisions while also reinforcing the group’s intended values, beliefs, and behaviors? Like positive reinforcement, which introduces a desirable or pleasant stimulus after a behavior has been completed and has been found to be effective for reinforcing such behavior, serious games introduce the behavior as a pleasant experience through engagement and entertainment. Where positive reinforcement relies heavily on the willpower of the subject to complete the behavior on their own, serious games introduce a motivational factor from the beginning of the behavior. Serious games are designed for purposes other than entertainment, such as training, learning, creating awareness, or behavior transformation through the introduction of content, topics, narratives, rules, and goals. They are immersive, engaging, and enjoyable, which enhances motivation and learning. The development of serious games is grounded in theoretical backgrounds, such as motivation, constructivism, flow experience, problem-based learning, and learning by doing. This method has been used in a variety of industries, including education, healthcare, military, policy analysis, and business functions such as marketing or financial purposes. They facilitate problem solving through challenges and rewards and use entertainment and engagement components. Serious games can address specific skills for many domains, foster collaboration, provide risk-free environments, and be used as analytical tools for educational research. They reinforce intended values, beliefs, and behaviors of players while conveying knowledge, skills, and attitudes, providing an integrated and effective approach to the transformation of an individual, group, or organization. The Handbook of Research on Decision-Making Capabilities Improvement With Serious Games discusses the use of advanced technologies including extended and immersive reality, digital twins, augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), mixed reality (MR), and IoT sensors to improve decision-making skills and learning through serious games. This book discusses user engagement, game adaptation, content adaptation, and sensor technology. It showcases how to increase decision-making skills in individuals and organizations and incorporates the latest developments in artificial intelligence and machine learning. Led by experts with over 20 years of experience and covering topics such as serious game design, intelligent content adaptation, and machine learning algorithms. This book is designed for professionals in education, instructional designers, curriculum developers, program developers, administrators, educational software developers, policymakers, researchers, training professionals, privacy practitioners, government officials, consultants, IT researchers, academicians, and students.

Simulation and game-based learning are essential applications in a learning environment as they provide learners an opportunity to apply the course material in real-life scenarios. Introducing real-life learning allows the learner to make critical decisions at different points within the simulation providing constructive education that leads to a cognitive understanding of the material. The use of simulations provides the learner with the ability to cognitively store and recall learning in real-life experiences. Therefore, it is crucial to not only provide course material but to have students apply what they have learned in simulations that replicate real-life scenarios. These learned skills are essential for students to be marketable and thrive in a career field where decision making, problem solving, and critical thinking are job requirements. Simulation and Game-Based Learning in Emergency and Disaster Management is a cutting-edge research book that examines the best practices and holistic development when it comes to simulation learning within emergency and disaster management as well as global security. Drawing upon the neuroscience of learning, classroom instruction can be enhanced to incorporate active-experiential learning activities that positively impact a learner with long-term information retention. Each simulation project is carried out in different environments, with different goals in mind, and developed under various constraints. For these reasons, this book will provide insight into the simulation planning and development process, provide examples of online simulations and game-based learning activities, and provide insight on simulation development and implementation that can be used across disciplines in educational and training settings. As such, it is ideal for academicians, instructional designers, curriculum designers, education professionals, researchers, and students.

This "fun and easy text-software design guide combination that uses an activity-based integrated curriculum: game-theory reading with game-building application lessons. It supports cross-curriculum and STEM learning as students use math and science principles, in addition to language arts, social sciences, and applied technology knowledge, to develop their own games. No knowledge of programming or game design is needed" before beginning with this textbook. -- Publisher