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G4LI Games for Learning
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Empowering Minority Youth STEM Learning through
Community Partnerships in Educational Game
Design
Alex Games Ph.D.
Microsoft
NSF statistics (U.S. 2007)
Job growth in STEM fields is 4 times total national workforce growth
Demographic trends suggest growth in STEM trained workforce will slow down and shift toward minority populations, particularly Hispanic
U.S. trails most OECD nations in secondary school completions and Hispanic students graduate high school at 20 average points lower rate than white peers
Hispanic representation in STEM professions is reducing in relation to their proportion of the U.S. population
Why teach STEM concepts through game design?For many Hispanic youth, videogames are an entry experience into computer technology
Modern computer games are built upon sophisticated computer simulations of real world systems (Clark et al. 2009)
Games tie the pursuit of understanding models to player goals (perceptions, identity, Games, 2010)
Good design pedagogies promote three mutually-reinforcing levels of understanding systems (Games, 2010)
Designer(s)AUTHORS
Game(s)MESSAGES
Material Play(TOOLS ANDCOMPONENTS)
Player(s)AUDIENCES
Ideal Play (MENTAL MODELS)
Real Play(CULTURE)
Assessing STEM Learning Pre and Post Camp
Words
Goals
Rules
Assets
Spaces
Play Mechanics (e.g. predator-prey)
Design and Concept Decisions
Inquiry
Audience
Modeling
Tool Use
Artifacts
Strategies
Practices
Learning STEM through Game Design
Programs within informal learning settings have a history of game design as a pedagogy
The Science and Art of Game Design
Uses a reverse engineering computational problems “under the hood” of games
TACIT => ARTICULATE KNOWLEDGE
Analogical Reasoning
STEM Game Design as Inquiry
Community Partners: one learning, everywhere
Conclusion
Educational Game Design is a space where youth can use THEIR OWN VALUED KNOWLEDGE to learn OTHER KNOWLEDGE, through PROBLEM SOLVING and PROBLEM POSING
Design and reverse enegineering are powerful methods to contextualize abstraction
Assessment as both product and process