IGDA, foundry10 and Seattle EdTech: Education & Games Industry Breakout
Edited by Josh Curry and Tim Cullings
With Contributions by James Flatmo, Jakub Kaztalski, and Tom Swanson
The Seattle chapter of IGDA recently worked in collaboration with philanthropy organization foundry10, Seattle Education Technology or EdTech, the Academy of Interactive Entertainment and Pacific Science Center to host the “Education & Games Industry Breakout,” a special one-night “compressed professional conference,” as described by IGDA organizer Tim Cullings. True to that statement, the event had everything from space for networking with IGDA or non-IGDA members, game developers within the Seattle community, and educators curious about the discussions, along with demos of educational games, and lectures large and small.
After sign-in and time for networking, the evening started with a panel conversation called “Connecting Across Industries” moderated by Tom Swanson of foundry10 and five industry leaders — Game Developers Mark Deloura and Dan Dixon, Educators Jessica Pilsner and Melissa Wrenchey, and Cami Smith from both Games and Education. This panel discussion brainstormed ideas for developing connections between educators and game developers, including what opportunities were being missed, and what educators and game developers could do to come together to help benefit students.
You can watch the entire panel discussion at our YouTube channel with the highlights summarized below:
The panelists explained that, although educators can benefit from using educational games in their classrooms, it’s not always easy to adapt them into curriculum materials to teach students about math, science, and other related topics. As an example, the panelists said that it would be nice if there were games designed to replicate the experience of a field trip that contains the space within the game itself for lesson planning. Another idea included building games around ideas like showing how it’s like to work within deadlines, learning to use soft skills, and particular technologies that will be relevant in the near future.
The panelists provided three examples of educational games, or tools being made using games engines, which have strong market potential— a VR level one trauma simulator, tools used for teaching professionals to drill for oil and gas, and interactive children’s books — but they argued that there is room for much more. The main argument they agreed upon is that it’s difficult to make games fun and useful at the same time. Even games combining educational and entertaining aspects, in a neologism that sometimes refers to this genre as “edutainment” games, that successfully balance their educational and entertainment values might not be readily available for teachers to use in classrooms.
Edutainment games might not be readily available to schools, either because of marketing, pricing, or the performance demands of certain games on school computers. One idea presented was creating a Steam-like platform for educational games, with strict moderation from educators, coupled with the types of games that are easy to run, such as browser-based games.
There’s another important question: Can educational games can be profitable? The panelists said that it’s typical for game developers to pitch their ideas to game publishing studios, which will then help fund and produce the game in order to sell the finished game to customers. What if there were educational game publishers that worked more closely with game developers to design games for use in classrooms? This might be one solution to increase the overall quality of edutainment games for both classrooms, and for gamers looking for new games to play.
After the panel discussion, Pacific Science Center’s auditorium and surrounding areas hosted a buzzing series of events: two talks in the auditorium, six breakout sessions, two labs, an area for demoing two edutainment games — Headliner: NoviNews and Supreme Courtship — and spaces in the surrounding hallways for networking with fellow professionals. The events lasted for around 25 minutes with enough time for networking and navigating to attend the next event. The events are summarized by section and alphabetically by the last name of the presenter below:
- Talks: “Gamification in Education” with James Flatmo
Flatmo focused on how gamification works in classrooms and strategies for increasing engagement with students using games. - Talks: “Ethics in Games: Exploring Complex Choices” with Jakub Kasztalski
Kasztalski used his work with the HEADLINER series to show how games presenting challenging ethical choices can help players and students in real-life scenarios. - Breakout Session: “Teaching Tabletop Design to Students” with Nate Heiss
Heiss drew on his experiences teaching tabletop and board games to foundry10 students in showing how these formats can educate students. - Breakout Session: “Games Curriculum/Lesson Plans” with Liz Hollerman
Hollerman asked teachers and educators how games could be used to develop their curriculum and lesson plans. - Breakout Session: “Card Gaming Systems and Environments” with Glenn Jones
Jones presented attendees with a forum where attendees could ask about how card games work and how they could be used within education. - Breakout Session: “Doing Research with Games” with Mike Scanlon
Scanlon presented the findings of his research, in collaboration with foundry10, related to how games can be effective learning tools for students. - Breakout Session: “Design Pattern for Indirect Education” with Jay Schneider
Schneider showed how games can teach players and students indirectly through playing and how educators can tap into games as learning tools. - Breakout Session: “From Concept to Product” with Marianna Vallejo
Vallejo showed teachers and game developers the process of starting with an idea for a game and executing that idea into a fully-realized product. - Lab: “Design Prototyping” with Emma Larkins
Larkins’s lab focused on group-based design and moving from the idea phase into a first minimum viable product or prototype. - Lab: “Rapid Prototyping” with Sonya Wolfram
Wolfram’s lab focused on exploring rapid and iterative prototyping, with the goal of creating, testing, and adjusting game rules and mechanics quickly.
True to the nature of the “compressed professional conference,” attending every event would have meant not being able to cover anything in any degree of depth, so the focuses below are on the auditorium talks.
The first talk was presented by James Flatmo, an instructor with AIE, titled: “Gamification in Education.”
Flatmo’s primary argument is that measuring statistics matters in the classroom. Games naturally have this element within them, so how can we bridge the gap?
Part of the reason might be because teachers have different perspectives and teaching styles. Some teachers might be early adopters of games in classrooms, whereas others might be more reluctant to change their curriculum to include games. Flatmo explained that middle school is typically where students start to ‘drop off’ from the educational system, in part because they no longer feel like the capability to be successful. They might not feel as smart in mathematics, and some teachers will say to the students: “Oh yeah, I’m bad at math, too.” The issue here is that math isn’t something you have or don’t have. There may be some natural aptitude based on personal interest or early studies, but primarily, education is a matter of the amount of time spent on a particular subject, and that failure is part of the learning process.
A way to ‘gamify’ education might be something as simple as a leaderboard. It might be difficult to implement for privacy concerns, but there’s an innate quality among gamers, Flatmo argues, where gamers will typically want to achieve a high score when possible. Flatmo also found that by the age of 21, most children will have spent 10,000 hours on games, so it’s a matter of leveraging the right type of games to encourage education. For example, games that encourage player versus environment situations can be useful to develop collaboration skills and knowledge in overcoming obstacles. In a final example, Flatmo presented the Bartle Taxonomy of Player Types to denote how designing toward gameplay types could be useful especially when adapting curriculum to engage more students. There are four main player types, based around how a player might interact with the game and its world. If game developers were to make games that encourage certain gameplay engagements like leaderboards, chatrooms, or achievements within a safe, moderated education environment, this could lead to more compelling engagement with the curriculum.
Flatmo’s “Gamification in Education” summary is quoted below:
- “After every activity, discuss with Shareholders (teachers, designers, students, others?):
- “What worked well? (Keep doing that)
- “What could use improvement? (Fix that on next iteration)
The second talk was presented by Jakub Kasztalski, creative director of political education games HEADLINER and Headliner: NoviNews, titled: “Ethics in Games: Exploring Complex Choices.”
Kaztalski used his game HEADLINER as an example of how games are the one form of art that is fully interactive. Teachers can then use this to display challenging perspectives with conflicting motives. The games has been used to teach media literacy at Pacific Buddhist Academy in Hawaii, and was nominated the “Best Social Impact Game” award in the Brazilian Independent Game Expo. This sparked a debate about the current President of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, on a Twitch livestream, and similarly sparked debates at the Geek Girl Con in Seattle, WA. Kaztalski’s company, Unbound Creations LLC, has made their games affordable in countries affected by media corruption, specifically the Philippines and Brazil, to help increase political education and awareness.
Kaztalski explained his process behind creating both games: By researching trends online and in real world case studies worldwide. Concerning politically-tense countries, he and his team extrapolated the political climate and what players would both enjoy playing and learning about, in regards to political and social situations. The sequel, Headliner: NoviNews, focuses on balancing one’s career, friends and family, and society responsibilities. The game is designed so that player can never succeed in every area, and has to decide what aspects are most important.
Complex situations are then broken down into more easily-understandable concepts. Globalization and Nationalism might be represented by debates over borders and the nature of war. Healthcare might be represented by debates over public versus private healthcare or a heavily-regulated healthcare structure versus a free market approach. Recreational substances might be represented by hype versus criticism with a focus on showing addiction. The nature of police might be represented by surveillance versus freedom. Kaztalski shows in-game examples, using the ideas of Newton’s third law, “for every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction,” and the idiom “no good deed goes unpunished.” By choosing to support the choices of certain characters, each of whom have different ideologies, the player can then learn about these complex debates where there is no right or wrong answer.
Kaztalski’s “Ethics in Games: Exploring Complex Choices” summary is quoted below:
- “Games have tremendous educational potential.”
- “Make events relevant and interesting.”
- “Humanize the trade-offs.”
- “Difficult choices spur critical thinking and debate.”
- “Use research-based arguments and rhetoric.”
- “Exposing media manipulation techniques.”
- “History is written by the victors. The present is written by the media.”
To summarize the “Education & Games Industry Breakout” event in a single thought; it was an excellent opportunity for educators interested in learning about how games can be brought into their classrooms, teaching students real-world skills that will guide them throughout their careers.
IGDA Seattle is the Seattle chapter of the International Game Developers Association, the largest non-profit membership organization in the world serving all individuals who create games. IGDA is designed to improve the lives of its members by enabling networking opportunities, and developing growth opportunities. Our events are open to members and non-members alike.
