Looking for a beginner’s crash course in game making software and process? Games can be an excellent teaching resource, and game development is easier than ever. Whether you’re looking to develop your own teaching resources or run a game-making program for users, this course will give you the information you need to choose the most appropriate software development tool, structure your project, and accomplish your goals. Plain language, appropriate for absolute beginners, and practical illustrative examples will be used. Participants will receive practical basic exercises they can complete in open source software, as well as guides to advanced educational resources and available tutorials.
This is a blended format web course:
The course will be delivered as 4 separate live webinar lectures, one per week on Wednesday November 21 and then repeating Wednesdays, November 28, December 5 and December 12 at Noon Central time. You do not have to attend the live lectures in order to participate. The webinars will be recorded and distributed through the web course platform for asynchronous participation. The web course space will also contain the exercises and discussions for the course.
Learning Outcomes
Participants will be able to name five different software tools available to assist them or their users in creating games and interactive web content, as well as identify the required knowledge and skills to effectively use each program.
Participants will be able to effectively structure the development process of a game from brainstorming to launch.
Participants will be able to identify and articulate areas in which games can increase educational effectiveness and provide practical, desirable skills.
Who Should Attend
Library staff looking to develop educational games or run game making programs for users (including tween or teen users).
Instructors
Ruby Warren
Ruby Warren believes in the power of play, and that learning is a lot more effective when it’s interactive. She is the User Experience Librarian at the University of Manitoba Libraries, where she recently completed a research leave focused on educational game prototype development, and has been playing games from around the time she developed object permanence.
<Cost
LITA Member: $135
ALA Member: $195
Non-member: $260
Moodle and Webinar login info will be sent to registrants the week prior to the start date.
Ubiquitous social media platforms—including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram—have created a venue for people to share and connect with others. We use these services by clicking “I Agree” on Terms of Service screens, trading off some of our private and personal data for seemingly free services. While these services say data collection helps create a better user experience, that data is also potentially exploitable.
The news about how third parties obtain and use Facebook users’ data to wage political campaigns and the mounting evidence of election interference have shined a spotlight on just how secure our data is when we share online. Educating youth about data security can fall under the larger umbrella of digital citizenship, such as social media uses and misuses and learning how not to embarrass or endanger oneself while using the internet.
Darvasi’s students in Toronto can pool together 55 faux bitcoins to purchase and launch the BOTTING protocol against an opponent. The student targeted at Fallon’s school in Connecticut would then have 48 hours to record audio of 10 words of Darvasi’s students choosing and send it back to them through an intermediary (Darvasi or Fallon). For a higher price of 65 faux bitcoins, students can launch MORPHLING, which would give the opponent 48 hours to record a one-minute video explaining three ways to stay safe while using Facebook, while making their school mascot (or a close approximation of) appear in the video in some way during the entire minute.
ProProfs Brain Games provides templates for building interactive crossword puzzles, jigsaw puzzles, word searches, hangman games, and sliding puzzle games. The games you create can be embedded into your blog or shared via email, social media, or any place that you’d typically post a link for students. If you don’t want to take the time to create your own game, you can browse the gallery of games. Most of the games in gallery can be embedded into your blog.
ClassTools.net templates for creating map-based games, word sorting games, matching games, and many more common game formats.
Purpose Games is a free service for creating and or playing simple educational games. The service currently gives users the ability to create seven types of games. Those game types are image quizzes, text quizzes, matching games, fill-in-the-blank games, multiple choice games, shape games, and slide games.
TinyTap is a free iPad app and Android app that enables you to create educational games for your students to play on their iPads or Android tablets. Through TinyTap you can create games in which students identify objects and respond by typing, tapping, or speaking. You can create games in which students complete sentences or even complete a diagram by dragging and dropping puzzle pieces.
Wherever I’ve demonstrated it in the last year, people have been intrigued by Metaverse. It’s a free service that essentially lets you create your own educational versions of Pokemon Go. This augmented reality platform has been used by teachers to create digital breakout games, augmented reality scavenger hunts, and virtual tours.
There was a time when Kahoot games could only be played in the classroom and only created on your laptop. That is no longer the case. Challenge mode lets you assign games to your students to play at home or anywhere else on their mobile devices.
Purpose Games is a free service for creating and or playing simple educational games. The service currently gives users the ability to create seven types of games. Those game types are image quizzes, text quizzes, matching games, fill-in-the-blank games, multiple choice games, shape games, and slide games.
What do you think are the main difficulties of using games for learning in higher education?
Rafaela Lima Santos de Souza, Masters Student in Production Engineering at Universidade Federal Fluminense, , Universidade Federal Fluminense, Universidade Federal Fluminense Rio de Janeiro Area, Brazil
