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Showing posts from March, 2010

More On Learning By Doing Civics Through Serious Games

Via: Filament Games Guardian of Law is also part of the suite of games d eveloped for Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's free, interactive, web-based program designed to teach civics and inspire students to be active participants in our democracy. The player is a Guardian of Law, a legal professional, who must establish Rule of Law in a futuristic, multicultural society inhabited by humans, alien species, and intelligent robots. Players explore SkyCity that uses the American legal system but has regions of lawlessness where specific civil rights are violated. The player meets people who have civil rights cases that must be resolved. After a player takes a case, the player finds case cards to support arguments. When the player has a sufficient number of case cards, the player goes to a courthouse to argue the case. As the player wins cases, rule of law is established, and SkyCity changes to reflect the effects of the civil right on society. Players will also be giv

Learning By Doing Civics Through Serious Games

Serious Games Help Students Learn By Doing Civics Rather Than Learning About It Via: Our Courts - Helping Middle School Students "Learn By Doing Civics" Rather Than Simply Learning About Civics! Our Courts is a web-based education project designed to teach students civics and inspire them to be active participants in our democracy. Our Courts is the vision of Retired Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who is concerned that students are not getting the information and tools they need for civic participation and that civics teachers need better materials and support. Our Courts hopes to promote civics education in the schools by creating discovery-based learning games for students and useful classroom resources for teachers. Georgetown University Law Center, The College of Teacher Education and Leadership at Arizona State University and Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University are the three lead partners in this initiative. Our Courts Gam

Filament’s Serious Games Suite: Finalist At SIIA CODiE Awards

Via:  Filament Games   - Suite of Energy Games Following my previous posts Uncharted Depths: Serious Games For Scientific Inquiry developed by Filament Studios, their website informs that the finalists have been announced for this year's SIIA CODiE awards, and Filament’s Suite of Energy games, developed for JASON Science , has been revealed as a finalist! The CODiE Awards, originally called the Excellence in Software Awards, were established in 1986 by the Software Publishers Association (SPA), now the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA), so that pioneers of the then-nascent software industry could evaluate and honor each other's work. Since then, the CODiE Awards program has carried out the same purpose - to showcase the software and information industry's finest products and services and to honor excellence in corporate achievement and philanthropic efforts. The CODiE Awards hold the distinction of being the industry's only peer-reviewed

Jason Science: Serious Games Educating Through Exploration

Serious Games Connect Students With Great Explorers Via: Jason Science – Education Through Exploration The Jason Project was founded in 1989 by Dr. Robert D. Ballard, the oceanographer and explorer who discovered the shipwreck of RMS Titanic. This prompted thousands of kids to write him letters, asking to join his next expedition. Technology was the way The Jason Project made that happen. Backed by National Geographic, this interactive and immersive site connects students with great explorers and great events to inspire and motivate them to learn science. The award-winning curricula embed cutting-edge research from NASA, NOAA, the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Geographic Society and other leading organizations and allow leading scientists to work side by side with JASON students. The Jason Project has always embraced technology as a way to connect real scientists doing exciting research in the field with teachers students around the world.   Given the

Uncharted Depths: Serious Games For Scientific Inquiry

Uncharted Depths - Also Dubbed The Game Of Scientific Inquiry What if the educational objectives of a game are about exploring rather than formally assessing? What if a game is designed to help a player form an opinion rather than be told an answer? These sound like Holy Grails for Serious Games, but Filament Games has tackled these issues head on and found out that designing around less explicit objectives actually requires a different kind of game experience . … Via: Filament Games About the Studio Filament Games, LLC is a game production studio dedicated to creating next generation learning games that combine best practices in commercial game development with key concepts in learning sciences. Filament's core directive is to create educational experiences that spark inspiration through interactive exploration and discovery. Secondarily, they seek to help teachers and parents excite their kids about learning, track their progress, and assess their performance.

Main Challenges Assessment In Serious Games Is Facing

Via: Gaming Lab – What About Assessment? Gaming Lab has posted earlier today a great article on the main challenges that assessment in Serious Games is facing, under the Adaptive Games tag. The post section Assessment information could be used to re-generate ”try again” game scenarios, has reminded a lot Noah Fahlstein’s talk at the 2010 Serious Games Summit on Open Possibility Set Games , which I quote: “Most every computer game arbitrates outcomes based on a finite set of rules and possibility sets. Many activities and problems in the real world require, at times, more complexity, and open possibilities. What would computer games look like if they had to account for a much larger universe of player action and reaction?” The point in question is that assessment information can become valuable not only per se, but also to improve game-play, both while playing and in future interactions. Open Possibility Set Games would then account for the above mentioned much larger my

LEEF 2010: Effectiveness of Serious Games as a Learning Strategy

Thursday - Friday, June 17-18, 2010 - Harrisburg, PA LEEF is an interactive professional development event showcasing the convergence of learning and entertainment technologies and exploring the organizational, design and technical challenges for adopting games and simulations for learning. The 2010 Learning and Entertainment Evolution Forum (LEEF) will explore the use of games, simulations and virtual worlds for learning and performance by looking at the needs for successful adoption, and will specifically explore how to addresses business objectives, design goals, and technical development needs. Demonstrating the effectiveness of games and simulations as an organizational learning strategy is a central theme of LEEF. However, this year’s program will focus less on why games and simulations are so effective, and will look more closely at how these approaches are successfully implemented and what steps can be taken to integrate this new approach into established learning org

Stein Institute Study: Benefits of Active Serious Games

Exergames may be an easily performed, entertaining, and viable method of promoting physical activity in older adults Via: Serious Games Source - Study: Exergaming Offsets Depression in Older Adults Via: Science Daily - Video Games May Help Combat Depression in Older Adults Stein Institute Study Shows Potential Benefits of Active Video Games Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine has found that Exergames may produce health benefits among older adults exhibiting symptoms of subsyndromal depression (SSD). In a pilot study, the researchers found that use of Exergames significantly improved mood and mental health-related quality of life in older adults with SSD. The study, led by Dilip V. Jeste, MD, Distinguished Professor of psychiatry and neurosciences at UCSD School of Medicine, Estelle and Edgar Levi Chair in Aging, and director of the UC San Diego Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Res

Globaloria: Preparing Youth To Become Serious Game Makers

The most active network of Globaloria, MyGLife.org is comprised of an open architecture of educational, programmable websites and related wikis that offer more than 100 educational activities, simulations and tutorials to play, learn, explore and contribute new ideas online. Via: World Wide Workshop Foundation Following my prior posting GDC 10 and Serious Games Breakthroughs , where I report on Globaloria STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) Games Competition, here are some further details on the Globaloria Program. The Globaloria Program was established by the World Wide Workshop Foundation in the spring of 2006. A network of educational, programmable websites and related wikis and Blogs, the Globaloria Program prepares young people (13 and older) to use technology, specifically to become makers of interactive games and simulations, for their own personal and professional development and for the social and economic benefit of their communities. As a

Serious Games On The Move Also @ MIT Sloan

Via: MIT Sloan's Business In Gaming - MIT Sloan’s 2nd Annual Business in Gaming Conference -   Registration Open! MIT Sloan held its inaugural Business in Gaming Conference (BIG) on May 8, 2009. Highlighting current transformations and trends in the gaming industry, the conference featured panels covering topics like Serious Games, in-game advertising, digital distribution, and massively multiplayer online (MMO) business models. MIT Sloan School of Management's 2nd annual Business in Gaming Conference (BIG) - Registration is OPEN!  This year’s event will be held on Fri­day, April 16th 2010 from 8am-5pm at the Microsoft New Eng­land Research and Devel­op­ment (NERD) Cen­ter in Cambridge, MA. This con­fer­ence is unique in that it focuses on the busi­ness side of the video game world. It will bring together indus­try lead­ers, game devel­op­ers, game design­ers, aca­d­e­mics, and stu­dents from lead­ing MBA schools and will facil­i­tate dis­cus­sions of the lat­

GDC 10 and Serious Games Breakthroughs

GDC & Serious Games Broadening Space @ Institutional Level Returning from GDC 2010 and trying to catch up with press coverage, I have realized that this year event has produced a number of breakthroughs. Here are a few value metrics: All-time Record Attendance Source: Serious Games Source News Organizers of the 2010 Game Developers Conference announced an all-time record of 18,250 game industry professionals attending San Francisco's Moscone Convention Center for the March 9th-13th event, surpassing last year's total of 17,000 attendees.   Offering a full five days of content, the event also hosted a extensive Exposition floor, featuring the biggest firms in the games space alongside the Career Pavilion and associated Game Career Seminar, the 12th Annual Independent Games Festival, the 10th Annual Game Developers Choice Awards, Game Connection America, and more opportunities for networking, discussing business, sharing knowledge,