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Betty Hayes: Learning from Kids’ Conceptions of Game Design

Filed at 12:09 pm on July 17, 2007 in Games • Leave a comment

When we first began to identify potential domains for assessment, we generated an extensive list of possible learning outcomes or domains associated with GameStar Mechanic. These domains ranged from the use of specialist language to understanding systems, problem-solving, computational literacy, collaboration, and more. In narrowing our focus, it seemed obvious that design knowledge and its manifestation in the games players design, had to be at the center of our assessment strategy. While we have a set of design principles and concepts that serve as the basis for GameStar Mechanic, and could draw on Katie’s experience teaching game design at the university level, we felt that we needed a better understanding of kids’ existing conceptions of game design.  What do middle school age kids think game designers do? What models do they have of games and how games are designed? What is the role of prior gaming experiences and preferences in these models? What are the various trajectories they might follow in developing design knowledge and applying it to the design of their own games? Answers to these questions are helping us determine how to assess “design learning,” including identifying indicators of learning as well as potential barriers to learning.  In addition, we are coming to a better understanding of what kinds of design knowledge might be most valuable and appropriate for kids at this age and level of experience with game design.

Talking with Kids about Game Design

During this past year, we’ve spent a lot of time observing kids play with GameStar Mechanic, looking at (and playing) the games they make,  and talking with them about games and game design. We’ve gained some helpful insights, including:

   

• Most kids lack a vocabulary to talk about game design, or to evaluate games. When we ask them what makes a “good” game, they tend to start by saying a good game is “fun” or “hard.” One of the first indicators of learning is a growing ability to identify more specific elements of games and how they affect game play.
• Initially the kids made many games that were simply not playable; there were too many enemies, no goal state, and so forth. Another indicator of learning is the increasing awareness of what makes a design a game, not a set of random elements.
• GameStar Mechanic gives players a lot of choices, in terms of the available game elements (creatures), core mechanics, and goal structures. For novice designers, the choices can be overwhelming. Reducing this complexity through challenges that set parameters on the game design can be crucial. We’ve found that many kids benefit from early challenges that require them to use only two kinds of creatures, or that specify a certain core mechanic. A sign of design knowledge is a growing ability to choose among multiple features and options for design.
• Playing a lot of games is as important as making them. Kids can be limited by their prior experience with games and lack of familiarity with a wide range of potential designs. We’ve begun to create and collect a wide range of games for kids to play and use as inspiration for their own designs. Another indicator of design learning is how kids first make use of such models and then creatively go beyond them.

In the next posts, Alex and Robert will provide more examples and observations from our ongoing GameStar Mechanic workshops with kids in Wisconsin and New York City.

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