Learning Science Meets Game Design

Why I Don't Clean House

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 08:36:00 +0000

If I meant my real house I'd be in trouble, but instead I mean this blog, one of my homes on the internet. There have been several times I've thought to myself that i should delete some posts, clean up some things and so on, but in truth I just fix some typos and such and move on. While I never was sure of the reason behind my lack of motivation, I may have today. It shows the path I have walked to get where I am. That's important in and of itself, and so, it shall be kept as it is, and has been, for all to see.

This came to me while reading other blog posts, that the history, the journey, is just as important for people to be aware of as the results. Knowing about the person, or people, behind something, how they get things done, and what their views are is just as important as the things they do in public.

People don't just up and do something big one day usually. So the history also has the value of showing how others might be able to pursue their dreams. It's been a few years since my educational initiative ideas came to mind, and by sharing the hardship and journey with others I might be able to inspire people to help and persevere. That would be worth the effort of blogging.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Picking One's Battles

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 21:42:00 +0000

When going through life their are some times when you have to makes sacrifices and concessions. Yesterday I made one, to be able to use a free piece of hardware. With it I can do a lot more, more easily. Without it I would have to do a lot more work. The catch was installing some software that I had no intention of EVER installing. I installed the software to be able to use the hardware, because it wasn't worth the battle to find another way.

To be honest, I've never been an Apple/Mac fan, not that I'm particularly fond of Microsoft either. It's just that I've seen Apple programs try to install other programs while updating, and I don't like the closed nature of their development stuff. This goes to the point that until yesterday, I've refused to install Quicktime onto my laptop. Then, my free iPod Nano 5G arrived in the mail.

With it I can record video clips. Those I can use to make compilation videos and add audio as I choose. Those can be used as internet content. Lots of potential for using the videos on blogs, for presentations and just doing silly stuff. All that because I was willing to install iTunes and Quicktime, which I didn't want to do.

If I had balked at that, I would have a piece of hardware that others want, that I couldn't use. Doing the videos would have been a little more of a pain using a digital camera, that isn't mine, putting together the digital videos so it doesn't seem like a boring slide show and covering all the content myself, rather than getting other people's voices into the videos.

Yesterday's Lesson: Choose your battles carefully.

This lesson is brought to you today because I was too busy with my new toy to even think of this post.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

A New Start

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 03:04:00 +0000

First, I've been sick for almost two weeks now and still working on this new start of my initiative. It's a cool little booklet I think will be really useful in helping people, and it will be freely available. Creativity, media literacy and play are big parts of the contents of the booklet, to help people in daily life. The other big thing I think I should mention is the description of learning cycles. I'm hoping this booklet will be helpful in applying for The Mind Trust Education Entrepreneur Fellowship.

I'm writing this little booklet, changing my initial focus in my initiative and still going for the same goals. Yep, that's about it for the moment. So, why am I posting this? Well, this is a blog that was started for the sake of the initiative and effort combining learning science and game design. That's not it though.

Or, at least I hope it's not all.

I like watching the Dog Whisperer, because it says that the problem behaviors of dogs are because of the behavior of humans, and proves it. There are several behaviors that just cause problems in life that become obvious while watching the show, but something else becomes obvious too. It's not enough to just hear, listen or intellectually understand ideas. Some of the people on the show are avid fans of the show and are failing in implementation, not memorization. Cesar Millan shows, corrects and encourages these people as they confront their fears and make mistakes.

One of the things noted in my house is that the dogs are behaving better, since I have been at home sick. Consistency, preventing escalation of unwanted behavior and encouraging wanted behaviors is all that has been different in their lives, because that's what I do that some of the others don't do as much. Yet, one of the big points that Cesar brings up constantly is the mental and emotional state of the human affecting the dogs. Staying calm through it all is important for the human and the dog the have a positive experience.

I think the basic guidelines and information on the booklet will help people stay calm more of the time. The reason is dealing with stressful situations and approaches to life. If you can approach life in a way that causes less stress, and have better ways of dealing with the stressful situations, life on the whole will be less stressful.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Gaming Beyond Boudaries

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 00:57:00 +0000

It's times like this that I am encouraged in my efforts with game design a learning science. Over at the Lost Garden, Dan wrote about a project to use gameplay to make Microsoft Office easier to understand and use. Another article I'm just reading now is one put out by the Defense Department of the US about the benefits of gaming on observation, creativity and handling new situations.

"I think we're at the beginning of a new science of learning," he [Ray Perez, a program officer at the ONR's warfighter performance department] said, "that will be the integration of neuroscience with developmental psychology, with cognitive science, and with artificial intelligence."

I've been going on about this for about a year and a half, while others have been talking about it for longer than that. Now it seems like some of the scientific proof is coming to prove what we've been saying all along, that game design can help educational design. Yet, this shouldn't discourage us little guys from putting our best out there for the world to see. Instead, it should encourage us that there are better times ahead.

We've known for a while that the US military has it's eyes on educational and training uses for video games. Besides the training simulators and similar games, there were the Army games made to share the experience with the public. I've also heard of combat video games being used to help experienced combatants re-integrate with civilian life. Yet this is even bigger than just the potential military uses. This is the military saying that their game-based training programs have had certain types of results.

It will be interesting to what happens this year.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Rethinking the Madness to My Method

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 03:50:00 +0000

Originally this blog was started due to my dedication to a learning and educational initiative project idea using communities, content and tools. I've posted several times about this idea in the past, and continue to try to get this dream to come true. However, some things have changed that have my changing my plans as to how to get this project going.

First is that I have a new resource coming my way, one of the new iPod Nanos that records video. I want to use this tool to create videos to put on the internet and leverage what I've learned about communication and making things interesting to other people for a project. That project is to include local artists, including students. I have some ideas for helping fellow artists improve their methods outside of art techniques. It's also a bit of a networking effort to possibly find local artists that would be willing to work with me on my goals. If nothing else I may be able to show them how including interesting materials into their art can improve the quality of their art.

Second is that I've realized that my focus on the technology is a hindrance to my efforts right now. With that in mind I'm going to focus more on getting something small going where I can create some good resources on creativity, critical thinking and more skills that some would say are not teachable. Of course, I plan on making those resources free and open, though I do have some monitization ideas for it. Yet, those effort would not change the accessibility of the materials. Instead, they would give me more to use to improve them. Maybe it will also include the "Downes Model" for some of it, though I have no idea how I might right now.

Anyways, the big thing is that by shifting my method, I can possibly get things rolling now and get somebody to help. With this I'm hoping that I might have a better chance at things like the Education Entrepreneur Fellowship run by The Mind Trust. I've entered twice and been unable to get past the first round of the selection process twice. If I'm doing and getting results, then I figure the odds go up that others will help.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Learnings Styles, or Skills?

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 01:22:00 +0000

I was just reading through the last week or so of OLDaily issues when this question came to mind, "Are learning styles really skills and/or literacies?" It's just that we have media literacies, critical thinking skills and memorization skills, so is it possible that learning styles are really a combination of skill and/or literacies? From my experience it makes sense to think of them this way.

I'd really like to get a response from Stephen Downes on this question, and that's why I'm actually making this post. With this way of looking at the concept of learning styles it makes sense that somebody could become a specialist in learning based on observation skills, literacies and more. Of course, what else there is in that is another thing I'd like to hear/read his opinion on. Perhaps comprehension, critical thinking and speed compatibility should be added to the list.

Personally, while I may have style preferences, I can learn pretty well in any of the traditional methods. However, this is something I've been working on specifically as skills for most of my life. As a more logic and thinking oriented person, I seek accurate information to work with. If the information is wrong, my conclusions are likely to be as well. Audio, visual and kinesthetic modes of learning all work pretty well, but they also have their own strengths and weaknesses.

While I would like to put my thoughts on the pros and cons of each mode into words, I find that the organization really doesn't fit with my thoughts and observations. Linguistics, both audio and visual, seems to be grouped together for their benefits in communication, but lake in robustness. The color, tone and other relative aspects of the language symbols used also have their place in this.

After looking some of this up, it appears to me that the above is in line with the Fleming's VARK model, based on the Wikipedia page for Learning Styles. Since I am trying to get the attention of Stephen Downes, it seems prudent to mention this, as otherwise he's likely to do so. Another note to make about this is that it is also the one that was shared with me in school as early as fourth grade, so there may be some influence there.

Having looked into the methods of creating video games for several kinds of physical disabilities, by working with a physically disabled artist and game designer, this seems closely tied to media literacies. For instance, surround sound and conditional noises together might be too much for somebody with sight to filter through in a game. However, that may be just fine for somebody who is blind and has to rely on their hearing far more than somebody with sight. In this way it seems like physical abilities mix with media comprehension type skills to allow a person to understand their surroundings, which could include content in media. Understanding this could help in all types of media and experience design as they are all forms of communication.

So, what do you think is needed to learn?

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Questions, Creativity and Critical Thinking

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 04:01:00 +0000

I was just reading a book, Wake Up Your Mind 101 Ways To Develop Creativeness by Alex Osborn in 1952. Besides being a wonderful book, that you can read online or download a couple ways from that link, it reminded me of something that has always bothered me, and then connected it to being a creative and critical thinker. It's asking questions, specifically children asking questions. What hit me was that if you tell a child to stop asking questions, you are telling them that being inquisitive is bad, and should be stopped. Then it also covered how the silliness of make-believe and pretending is the same in exercising our creative and critical thinking capacities. A child told to stop asking questions and stop playing around is then like a child not allowed to physically play or exercise.

Part of the reason this really hit me is how often people get irritated with children asking questions and how often I'm thanked for patiently fielding such onslaughts. A bright, intelligent, creative mind is a beautiful thing to watch in motion, so I normally enjoy these Q&A sessions with little children. There are exceptions, mostly due to the child trying to be annoying or irritating, but that is rare I've found.

A child asking a question is asking to be taught, to be guided, yet this action is commonly condemned until the child is deemed ready for such activities. At that point the child has learned that their acceptable role is to not ask questions, accept what they are told and to not think critically for themselves. Then they(we) are punished for not being creative and thinking critically sometimes, and at other times being punished for being creative and thinking critically. I can't help but think of a line from the movie Ever After, "If you suffer your people to be ill-educated, and their manners corrupted from infancy, and then punish them for those crimes to which their first education disposed them, what else is to be concluded, sire, but that you first make thieves and then punish them?"

The innate motivation of playing games is one of the big reasons people are looking into the potential of games for learning and education. Asking questions is like playing games when it comes to motivation. The insatiable curiosity of children and their questions should be enough evidence of that.

I'm not the biggest fan of "growing up", and never really have been. See, children play and adults work. Let me rephrase that, a dolt works, or is made a dolt by the work mentality. Playing is not always fun, but it is far more enjoyable than work. Enjoying what you do, having fun with it and playing with it takes more thought. A dolt doesn't play, because even games become work for them. Playing around doesn't mean you can't be responsible, respectful and reliable. "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy", and both dull and dolt refer to those who are not intellectually inspiring.

Now, that may be a little biased, as I am something of a gamer. However it seems to me that the more playful a person is, the more creative and critical thinking they do. The less playful they are, the less they do such thinking.

This seems to be what has happened in education. Students are expected to work, and thus take a work mentality to the whole matter, usually. This fits the pattern of just trying to do well on tests, or in grades. The lack of enthusiasm, motivation and extra effort can be seen in work mentality work environments. This gets at the heart of what a game is, at least to me

"creative companies do often have think symbols in the work place that remind us, remind people, to be playful and that it is a permissive environment" & "we think playfulness helps us get to better creative solutions, helps us do our jobs better and helps us feel better when we do them" - http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/tim_brown_on_creativity_and_play.html

Perhaps game design lessons can help education bring back the curiosity and questions that come with a play mentality.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

National Standardized Testing to Communism

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 01:17:00 +0000

So I was reading OLDaily and came across a blog post called Debunking the Case for National Standards. The parallel that came to mind was from my social studies classes, Communism. Both treat everybody the same, treat people like cogs in a machine and treat alternatives like public enemies. While not an alarmist, that is what came to mind about the idea and effects of a Nationalized, Standardized Testing system.

These three things are just thoughts to keep in mind.

Equal and Same, are not the Same

Variety is the spice of life, supposedly, and is evident in many aspects of life. One of those is teamwork. If a writer and an artist work together they can create a better comic book than two artists or two writers. Even assuming equal talent, two writers do not use the same skills in the same ways. That goes for artists, programmers, mathematicians and scientists. Equal is based on value, while the other is based on similarity.

Now, let's try jobs, where the same pattern is also in evidence. Two jobs, say writer and editor, may be equal, even though they are not the same. Two Editors, while equal in ability, may not be the same in skills or use of those skills.

Equal: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/equal
"like or alike in quantity, degree, value, etc.; of the same rank, ability, merit, etc."

Same: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/same
"identical with what is about to be or has just been mentioned"

Another aspect of this is that the differences in people can cause the value to be seen only via different methods or angles. It's not that a single test can't do the job, but rather that it would have to be adaptive and relative in it's multi-faceted scoring. Then the results have to be framed as the results of a dedicated effort to measure and be measured. That kind of result is then limited in usefulness, as there are people who do worse in artificial situations than in real situations, and the other way around.

Cogs don't Think Critically

A cog in a machine is supposed to do it's one job, and nothing else. It's another cog's job to evaluate the effectiveness of the system. It's another cog's job to suggest a solution. As a cog who is not designated to do either of those things, doing them takes away from the current job, whatever that may be. As a student in a test score oriented education system, the job is to do well on tests, not learn.

Please don't get me wrong. Effort and being rewarded for that is good, as is being able to focus, but this is going overboard. Takes Japan's education system for example. There are some aspects I really, truly love about it, and others I detest. A student is expected to be a student, supported as a student and their teachers are respected for their roles in the lives of the students. However, you have to test into even your junior high and high schools. Being segregated (Remember that word from American history?) by your test scores is not something I like about the system. There are after-school schools specifically for test-prep, nothing else. There's a special name for the university entrance exams, "Exam Hell".

Students are humans, not cogs. There are generally two types of motivation in life, survival and desire. Survival is an externally triggered motivation, while desire is internally motivated. In a test driven education system, the student is trying to survive the experience with their goals intact. They don't study because they desire to learn, but rather to survive the tests. Depending on survival motivation can lead to a culture of fear.

No Alternatives means No Freedom, or Innovation

Innovation needs some pressure most of the time, but there should also be hope mixed in. If there is no hope, there is little motivation, except being cornered, to innovate. Since there is an upper limit to all our system designs, it makes sense that the designs will need to be redone eventually. That usually comes from innovation.

So long as there is a way to do-it-yourself, there is the freedom to innovate. This is both inside and outside the system. If a teacher is not allowed to alter the curriculum for the benefit of their class, they lack the freedom needed to do their job well, let alone implement something new. If a student has only one way to get recognized for their skills and knowledge (two different things), they are stuck.

Now this brings up the problem of technically functional solutions, emphasis on "technically". See, if you can test out of course, but it costs the same as normally taking the course, why would you risk taking the test instead of just taking the course? I just see when the test is better than the course for you. That doesn't seem like most people, so it seems that while the option is technically available, it isn't really helpful. If you have to do well on a test, but the test doesn't reflect your true capabilities in a real life application of the curriculum, you're stuck hoping for an alternative or aiming for the test. The test technically is measuring your abilities, just not in a helpful way. This is just the start of the problem.

When there are no options, humans will eventually make an option, or endure. If it's bad enough to warrant making another option, but there is a technically functional solution in place, there is a problem. Some will point at the solution they think works and say there isn't a need. Some will say that the effort should go through the solution that is already available. Some will say that you are being selfish and rebellious for not being willing to work within the system. These take the steam out of innovative efforts just as much as having many secret supporters and nobody to back you in public. Sometimes having no alternatives is disguised so it looks like there are alternatives, and more in the works, with nothing that will help and some that will harm.

Like I said, I'm not an alarmist, but this does seem like something to keep in mind. History tells us that humans don't do well when treated like nameless, faceless numbers in the system. They don't think critically or creatively, for the most part, under those conditions. To me, this seems to indicate that we should allow for some, I repeat, SOME, individuality in how students are treated, what they learn and how they get things done. I'm neither a robot, nor a clone, nor somebody who wishes to cause chaos, so why should I, as a student, be treated like that? Like I said, it's just something to think on, and remember.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Education, Star Trek Style

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 08:08:00 +0000

Yesterday I saw the new Star Trek movie, and besides enjoying the movie I was inspired to think about a test scene, and why it was lacking. While I won't give away the good parts, there are a couple points to make note of in the earlier plot. First, James T. Kirk passes a supposedly unpassable test. Second, Spock and Kirk have a debate about the whole situation. That's what got me thinking about the test, and how I would have redesigned it to be more effective.

A while back I made a post, "Edupunk, Star Trek Style". It included a funny little scene that popped into my head that seemed to sum up a fair bit of the Edupunk concept. In much the same way an idea popped into my head and I see parallels that I want to share. Okay, so last time I wanted to share the funny little scene, but that's not important.

The test set-up looked to be a star ship bridge simulator running a scenario designed to make people face their fears. However, such a test seems ineffective to me, considering the goal. Here's why, nobody ever beat the simulation, so few ever expect to "win", and there results of such a "loss" were negligible in every way. It wasn't about winning or losing; it was about how you performed during the test. However, if the people taking the test do not live in the fake reality for that time, they are not going to behave the same as they would in real life, and would have the same fears to face. See the problem?

So, I got to thinking about the problem, and tried to come up with a different design that would work. After some thought, a couple changes came to mind. First, make the loss more significant. This is because without significance, the loss means little to those taking the test and thus has less effect on their behaviors. Second is to make the situation more real in general to the test taker. The fake bridge sounds good, but if it doesn't get dirty, explode and support the simulated experience it will be a constant reminder that the whole thing is staged, pretend.

How to make the loss more meaningful and the experience more real then became my goal. Without the chance to win, you will always lose, and that makes losing normal, average and expected. If there is a chance to win, you may not lose. While that doesn't make losing less normal all by itself, it does give an opportunity to make it less normal. That's why it seemed like doing the same type of task on a regular basis to reflect the rolls the star fleet cadets are training for would be best. Most of the time they won't be doing anything too complicated or difficult. That means success becomes a regular situation, assuming the participants can perform at the required difficulty level. Then when the crazy tasks come out of the blue, like in real life, they are taken by surprise. That makes situation more realistic and a loss more meaningful, because if you "killed" your crew in the simulation, you probably would have got them killed in real life.

The general idea seems transferable to non-Star Fleet training to me. It is just applying a few general patterns to the "test" to make the "test" more effective. Last time I checked there are still lots of tests in school and education, so maybe applying these patterns to testing in schools would make them more effective too.

1) Real Application
If I'm using the same skills being taught, but with meaning, purpose and a connection to real life, I'm more likely to care about my performance. This is because I can see how my performance in the now reflects my chances in "real life". So, it makes sense to make the application of skills be real life applications instead of memorization verification questions.

2) Regular Application
If it is realistic, there are likely to be few killer problems to face, but there will be plenty to do. This is your practice for mastery, and a chance for exploration of possibilities. This also sets up a reliable, consistent aspect that can be depended on.

3) Random Application
If everything is standardized in obvious ways, the entire process becomes sterile and clean. The value of testing somebody in a non-realistic way is little. The value of repeated, predictable homework is little. Without variety, the mind doesn't engage as much. That means there is less thought, less critical thought.

4) Relevant Application
If it means nothing to me, why should I care? If it's all for the grade, why should I care about anything else? In the Star Trek concept, it was easy, because the people are being trained for positions in a military organization. In our schools, we have more possibilities to contend with. Instead of the old approach of just learning what you are going to be using at work, I think we should be exploring and learning a wide variety of possibilities.

That last one points to a part of the problem of self-discovery, as does the second. It also reminds me of a quote. "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein If we keep looking over the same information, keep reliving the same experiences, how are we to find out anything new, when we haven't the last 40 times? If there are several ways to approach a math problem, and you try them, you can find out which makes the most sense to you and what they work best for. You can learn the reliable behaviors. The same can be applied to the way people learn. In one math class I found that doing the homework normally didn't work well for me, so I talked with the teacher to adjust the method to better fit me. In the end it worked out well. As a side note, that quote fits perfectly with the scientific method It seems we could use more of this in the schools.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Voluntary Learning

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 21:53:00 +0000

Continuing in the vein of thought from my, "What is a Game?" post, it's been going through my head about the play aspect of games when it comes to education.

"if its purpose is more important than the act doing it, it probably isn't play" - http://www.ted.com/talks/stuart_brown_says_play_is_more_than_fun_it_s_vital.html

Just today I came across an essay at the Lost Garden that says games should grant the freedom to leave and the freedom to participate. With that being the case we have to look more at motivation and keeping people involved. It also seems to mean that games for serious learning goals need to be a part of personal, unofficial learning, rather than an official part of education.

People have been talking about the motivation that is a natural part of games, but that is mostly for those who choose to play them repeatedly. Your standard game is like most of today's toys and tools; single purpose. This means that they are made to do one thing, and if that one thing doesn't interest you, the game won't interest you.

Now, with that line of logic is makes sense to aim for multiple purposes. However, with multiple purposes you sacrifice some of your time and effort from your main purpose to devote to the other purposes. So, those only interested in one thing will go buy the single purpose games they're interested in, and have been trained to look for.

At this point it may look a little bleak, but there is hope. For instance, learning just about anything can be improved when you use high quality teaching methods, but what are they? Sure, a person needs the info to do things, but memorizing facts is not going to make a person proficient in a skill. Yet, it seems really hard to properly quantify a quality. That's where games can come in, as pleasant practice.

If you ask a student today whether they would rather do pages of math & science problems or play a good game that includes that helps just as much, there may be a chance for multi-purpose games. See, up till now they normally aim at competing with for fun games when they are made for more than fun. That is likely the wrong demographic. Aiming for those who want to learn more with less time, effort and pain could do a lot more, if you get the learning methods of good game design to apply to the topic.

Of course, if you ask those same students if they would rather play an enjoyable game that could replace their reading and practice homework, I'd guess you'd have a higher percentage wanting to play the game. Textbooks are one of the aspects of schooling that really don't hold the interest of most students, and reading doesn't have a statistically high retention rate compared to reading and immediately using. This is how the games should be framed for the students, as either an alternative to the normal methods, or as extracurricular activities.

Personally, I'd love to have been able to play a game and get extra credit, or replace assignments with gameplay. Some assignments really don't work so well for this, but repetitive work like math problems, science questions and so on are perfect for game alternatives. Part of this is that you are giving the work a direct, related value for being done.

Another aspect of this is that it can answer the real live usage question and cover some cross-topic aspects of learning. By having the problems wrapped in a relevant setting with realistic results, such as a business accountant for a small business doing different levels of difficulty of math, people can understand the connection to money matters, running a business and some economics in a single game, or game series.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Work Ethic and Play

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 17:44:00 +0000

It may seem like a strange combination, but this whole concept is based off of the quote, "if its purpose is more important than the act doing it, it probably isn't play" ( http://www.ted.com/talks/stuart_brown_says_play_is_more_than_fun_it_s_vital.html ). The idea is that if the quote is true, which I think it generally is, then work ethic is key to making more of life possible play situations. Why, because work ethic is caring for how well you do the work.

If asked about the purpose of work, many would say that it's to get paid, to pay the bills or both. Those focused on the long term goal loose track of the short term goal of getting the job done, but even focusing on the short term goal isn't enough for this relationship. See, it's still about the purpose, not the doing.

As much as this may irritate people, life isn't linear. Working towards a single goal, long term or short term, can cause problems. How? Let's say you make bagels. (Why bagels, because that's what came to mind first.) In making bagels there are several processes that happen in the kitchen, several business and selling processes as well. Now, if your focus is to do well financially, you will likely start valuing money more than product quality, employees and so on. Putting bagels on tables becomes more important than the bagels on the tables.

This is where the work ethic concept comes into play. If you care more about the doing than the purpose, the bagels rather than making money, you are more satisfied with the customer reactions and being able to continue doing the job, even when things get tight. The money and the quality of the effort are indirectly connected to the pay received to a person with high work ethic. The pay, the goal, the purpose is less important to them than the act of doing it, and doing it well.

It reminds me of the work places where people do what they love. They joke with each other and with the customers. So long as they can continue doing the job, they are happy to continue. How could this help you have a happier work experience?

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

What is a Game?

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 20:45:00 +0000

This is a question that has given rise to thousands of hours of thought, discourse and more. Today I'll add my views to the many out there, and maybe it will add something of value to the ongoing discussions.

So, what is a game?

What defines a game?

What are the defining traits of a game?

...

Gameplay.

So, what is "gameplay"?

"Gameplay includes all player experiences during the interaction with game systems, especially formal games. Proper use is coupled with reference to "what the player does". Arising alongside game development in the 1980s, gameplay was used solely within the context of video or computer games, though now its popularity has begun to see use in the description of other, more traditional, game forms. Generally, the term gameplay in video game terminology is used to describe the overall experience of playing the game excluding factors like challenges and movement. The term game mechanics refers to sets of rules in a game that are intended to produce an enjoyable gaming experience." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gameplay

Alright, playing with a game = gameplay. That just brings up more questions. What are game mechanics, play and what's the deference between a toy and a game?

A game mechanic is easy. "A game mechanics is a construct of rules intended to produce an enjoyable game or gameplay." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_mechanic

Let's try play. I've done a bit of looking into the subject and found that it's covered pretty well in some TED talks and blog posts. In the end it seems to be a different way of approaching a situation, with the possible opposite being "work". That doesn't seem to be very helpful either, as anything can then be play or work.

"if its purpose is more important than the act doing it, it probably isn't play" - http://www.ted.com/talks/stuart_brown_says_play_is_more_than_fun_it_s_vital.html

"creative companies do often have think symbols in the work place that remind us, remind people, to be playful and that it is a permissive environment" & "we think playfulness helps us get to better creative solutions, helps us do our jobs better and helps us feel better when we do them" & "Kids are more engaged with open possibilities. Now, they'll certainly, when they come across something new, they'll certainly ask, 'what is it?'. Of course they will, but they'll also ask, 'what can I do with it?'" - http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/tim_brown_on_creativity_and_play.html

"What we do know is, if you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original." - http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html

"it is obvious to me that there are a plethora of skills that are just waiting to be turned into games" - http://lostgarden.com/2008/06/what-actitivies-that-can-be-turned-into.html

So, that leaves us with the difference between a toy and a game. You play a game and play with a toy. A game is an activity, while a toy is a thing used in an activity. Activities have rules. Some, such as most game mechanics, are built into the functions of a toy used to play the game. Others are agreed on and enforced by those playing the game. So, to play the game is to be playing in accordance to the rules that govern the gameplay.

I am left with a semi-vague, but far more useful definition than I've come across so far. A game is an activity with an agreed upon set of rules, that participating individuals act in accordance to, while in a state of play. More over, I find there is significant opportunity to improve the world through learning science and game design lessons being implemented in games and learning environments.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Valuenomics

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 00:04:00 +0000

Yes, it is another something-"nomics" word, but I think the ideas I'm about to post should have a lot of value to just about everybody who wants to have sustainable growth in value.

In traditional economics it is said that the price to sell at is where the supply and demand lines cross. This means that the price and number of things match for both the buyer and seller. I'm not so sure about this, and haven't been since going over it in a college microeconomics class. Something just seems off to me.

That where I come to the growth aspect of my thoughts. Sure, meeting the demand of the consumers and making money is good, but it all is too abstract to be applied too strictly. Also, it's way too narrow for my tastes. Instead, look at the value of the thing to be sold from both the buyer and seller's points of view.

If the buyer values the thing more than the seller, we have the setting for a win-win situation. Sell someplace in the middle and everybody gains. The seller is getting more than they need to continue, and the buyer is getting a bargain. Both have their limits for the deal. This is the best situation.

If they value the thing equally, there is still value to be gained. In a situation like this the value comes from being able to continue doing what you need/want to do. Workers need to eat, and farmers need workers, so they find a suitable arrangement of equal value and continue to live comfortably. This is what traditional economics says to aim for.

Obviously, if there is no value on the thing that both are willing to agree on, then there is no deal. So, let's get back to the two situations described above.

Let's compare the situations of equal and unequal, but overlapping. Farmer 1 and farmer 2 both sell apples for $5 per unit, however much that is. Farmer 1 values the unit at $5 and so do his customers. Everybody gets the items at what they value them. Farmer 2 values his apples at $4, and his customers value them at $6, meaning they all get more value return than what they gave. Get what you give and get more than what you give, not much of a comparison.

Being this is posted on a blog about game design and learning science, you might be wondering why I'm posting about economics. After all, this isn't a blog on money. However, this is a blog that covers motivation, which is where topic is heading.

See, the buyer and seller are motivated to make a deal. However, greed and "business" have pushed this to the point that the markets are in bad shape. Business to a craftsman is to sell enough at a high enough price that he can continue living, working and providing any dependents. Business to a businessman is a craft. That's fine, because the craftsman works to work some more. The money isn't important compared to the craft. However those who do a craft, rather than being a craftsman may be doing it merely as a way to make money.

Those non-craftsmen walk a dangerous path, because they seek money. That's their focus. When you seek money, it can become more important than the craft. The things money can bring can become more important than the one's duties as a craftsman. Gaining can become more important than giving.

One person is not very effective at gaining value, but can be extremely effective at giving it. Remember the situation mentioned above with both sides gaining rather than making an exchange? It's the same thing. In a video game, one might have put out 100 points of effort value and gained 15 to 20 points of currency value. Or, one could have gained 7 - 10 in currency value and 20 - 50 in reputation and other forms of value by putting half into helping others. Being helped can then increase the value gained with and without effort on your part. This is in part how social marketing works, by the assistance of others.

In an educational setting we can apply the same situation rules with levels of buy in. The student who highly values the offered education will put in more effort than those who do not. How they assign value to the offered education is not within the scope of this post, but the implications are. There is more to this than just valuing the education, because of the value of the grade.

Here we get into multiple values for the same thing. This becomes very complex ,very quickly. Reality does that. For both the education and the grade there is value, effort and return. So a student who doesn't value the education, but does value the grade, will just do what they think will help them get the grade. Another student may not value the grade, but value the education, and thus focus on learning, not passing the class. Then there are those who value them about the same and go for both equally. On top of that, there are different levels of return on the effort applied. Merely applying oneself isn't enough. It has to be applied in the right ways.

Though I wonder about some parts of this. See, if we teach people the value of work by extrinsic motivators like our work being valued by others we then try to do things that others value giving them control over what we do.

...

If we teach it though enjoying what you do people then try to find things they like to do, without necessarily giving activities that aren't immediately, and always, fun a chance.

...

If we try to go the middle road we then have to leave it up to the people to choose which out of the three options they will take.

In the end this third option seems like the best route to me. With roll models taking the working for stability and to be able to work some more route, we have social proof of the craftsman life. Interdisciplinary teams working on projects in learning environments could then work as testing grounds. Through such experiences and educating them on the value of working together, and not just for yourself, there might be some hope.

Now I guess the questions are "what do we need to share with people" and "how do we create interdisciplinary projects for them?"

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Pride Inhibits Learning

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:40:00 +0000

One must yield to learn. In another post I have partially done I'm likely to touch on this, but this is a good point on it's own. One must yield to the reality of the situation, to whatever and/or whoever is teaching, to accept one's own limitations to surpass them. In essence, to learn, one must be willing to say I can't do it, yet.

Another way to put is, if you're right, you're not wrong. Simple, but profound when applied to ones approach to life. I assume that as a finite being with finite understanding that part of everything I do is wrong. This means that there is always room to improve.

In first grade I new a kid who said he knew everything. He sat in a corner working at the only computer in the room. His math book was huge and I don't doubt that he knew more complex math than I did at the time. That's not to say I wouldn't have been able to understand it. You see, after boasting that he knew everything I asked him why he was there. That confused him. So, I explained that obviously a person who knows everything has no reason to be in school learning anything, as they already know everything. He wasn't pleased with me.

In that situation he yields to the teacher, but was not willing to yield to other students. He assumed the teachers knew more than him and that the other students couldn't measure up. Thus, anything on school subjects had to come from a teacher, not another student. When this belief was confronted in some way, he got mad, rather than concede the point, yield. Later he may have yielded to the reality of the situation, but not to the student who pointed it out.

That may not be the best example, but if you think back on how you were thinking when you made progress learning you should see the pattern. There is overcoming an obstacle in which you yield to the problem and the reality of the situation that how you were doing things was in some way lacking, motivating you to try harder, or try something new. There is also yielding to an instructor or adviser who you think might have something useful to say. If you won't listen, their words aren't as effective.

Sometimes there will be improvement in spite of unyielding pride. That's why the title says pride "inhibits" learning, because that's what it does. Belief in yourself can bolster you hope, and thus your motivation and effort. Refusal to stop trying and putting out effort to improve is dedication. Both are confused as part of pride, since they come in groups sometimes. However, pride says, "I'm better than you/them." This means not accepting help, guidance, advice or reminders. This means you are more likely to make mistakes. Learning from your own mistakes is good, but learning the mistakes of others is better. However if you are prideful you might refuse to implement something because somebody told you to do it.

All in all it is better to be humble and value the work above your pride. That's what I've found.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Acceptance and Tolerance

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 21:12:00 +0000

I would like to share with everybody a comparison of the terms "accept" and "tolerate". It has come up in a game design discussion on Twitter that certain words, acceptance and tolerance, are generally misunderstood, or used, when it comes to the behaviors of others. This started with a tweet saying that somebody had asked their class if they would play a game with a homosexual male hero rather than a heterosexual male hero, and that nobody said they would. Immediately after that came a tweet that called such people "pathetic" for not wanting to play a game with that content as though they were condemning others for their choices by not being willing to act out those choices in a game. Acceptance gets thrown around in these situations, but accepting an idea for yourself isn't the same as accepting the views of another. The latter is tolerance if you don't agree.

So, let's start off with some definitions to give a common ground.

Accept Definition | Definition of Accept at Dictionary.com

"ac⋅cept
–verb (used with object)
1. to take or receive (something offered); receive with approval or favor: to accept a present; to accept a proposal.
2. to agree or consent to; accede to: to accept a treaty; to accept an apology.
3. to respond or answer affirmatively to: to accept an invitation.
4. to undertake the responsibility, duties, honors, etc., of: to accept the office of president.
5. to receive or admit formally, as to a college or club.
6. to accommodate or reconcile oneself to: to accept the situation.
7. to regard as true or sound; believe: to accept a claim; to accept Catholicism.
8. to regard as normal, suitable, or usual.
9. to receive as to meaning; understand.
10. Commerce. to acknowledge, by signature, as calling for payment, and thus to agree to pay, as a draft.
11. (in a deliberative body) to receive as an adequate performance of the duty with which an officer or a committee has been charged; receive for further action: The report of the committee was accepted.
12. to receive or contain (something attached, inserted, etc.): This socket won't accept a three-pronged plug.
13. to receive (a transplanted organ or tissue) without adverse reaction. Compare reject (def. 7).
–verb (used without object)
14. to accept an invitation, gift, position, etc. (sometimes fol. by of)."

If you look, most of that is using the word as positive affirmation of some sort, agreeing with the views stated. However, the big difference between accept like that and accepting the views or choices of another is in what you are saying is true, right, okay and so on. If accept that the sky is blue, that means I now think the sky is blue. If I accept that you think the sky is green with brown spots, that means I now think you think the sky is green with browns spots. It does not mean I agree that the sky is green with brown spots. Why is this important? Well, to say they mean the same is to say that "yes" is the same as "no", which obviously makes it inaccurate in normal uses.

Tolerate Definition | Definition of Tolerate at Dictionary.com

"tol⋅er⋅ate
–verb (used with object), -at⋅ed, -at⋅ing.
1. to allow the existence, presence, practice, or act of without prohibition or hindrance; permit.
2. to endure without repugnance; put up with: I can tolerate laziness, but not incompetence.
3. Medicine/Medical. to endure or resist the action of (a drug, poison, etc.).
4. Obsolete. to experience, undergo, or sustain, as pain or hardship."

So, to tolerate does not mean to agree with or to help, but rather not to take action deliberately against whatever is being tolerated. It's like patriotism. Being a patriot doesn't mean you are against the other groups, but rather that you are for your own group. Put that into views and opinions and you get tolerance of other views and opinions. As an American this hits close to home, as one of the big topics of American history is tolerance of religious, social and other beliefs that don't take away the rights of others. In essence, tolerance means taking a neutral stance of taking no specific effort to help or hinder with no mention of your own beliefs, though the assumed would be that you disagree.

So, the discussion and those words apply to both education and game design via human interaction. Let's look at the conversation as it happened.

Person A: Asked my class if they'd play a game in which a male hero saves a male love interest rather than a female one. No one said yes.

Person B: realy? there are people that pathetic still around these days? depressing

Myself: A lack of interest in playing a particular style of game design or story doesn't make one "pathetic".

Person C: Not particular style, supposedly in modern culture we should be able to accept the difference with a blink of the eye

Another person joined the discussion, while persons A and B did not join the discourse that arose out of their comments. Two ideas seemed hard to get through in it, that one's choice in games to play doesn't necessarily mean anything more than personal preference of games to play and that one can "accept the difference" without agreeing. To the credit of Person C, who with myself did most of the discussing, they considered the ideas rather than just dismissing them. Plenty of people get into the polarized debate mentality which segregates people into allies and enemies. Many people take it a step farther and assume the if you agree with them you are right and if you disagree you are close minded, wrong and possibly stupid. It only gets worse with sensitive topics. That's why I said that it was to the credit of Person C that they didn't close their mind to the possibilities.

Besides the obvious uses in a classroom and game to shape the experience, their is another possibility to use this to help people think in a more open minded and humane way. Each individual has at least one motivation for any particular action. To dismiss that thought, reasoning and views behind another's actions is to think of the person as sub-human. In learning about the views and reasons behind the actions of others, one can come to terms with the idea of tolerating, because that is agreeing to disagree. Doing that requires acceptance of the other person's humanity, intelligence and worth as a human; unless you are thinking of the person as a thing.

That's easily understood as being applied to the "audience", students or players. In the classroom some students need help to understand what comes easily to others, be that extra time from the teacher or something to overcome a disability. The same goes for players. I've worked on a User Interface with Rob Florio and had classes with a person who in high school and college who was barely able to hear and speak. I've also done tutoring since middle school, so my personal view is that everybody has both strengths and weaknesses, but some are more obvious than others. Each person is a human, and individual, with emotions, beliefs, thoughts, reasoning, dreams and motivation.

However, that is the application that shapes the experience while the other application is putting people into situations that challenge how we view life. A great example are the stories where it seems that one of the villains is cruel and ruthless beyond redemption till it becomes known that the person has been having ethical dilemmas the whole way and was misinformed. Would you have been wrong in their shoes? This can also be seen in the stories where you gain understanding as to why the overly-strict teacher, or supervisor, is so strict. Maybe they have their own problems that have mentally and emotionally scarred them. It's also possible they are handling way more than you know or they can easily handle. Maybe they were right to be that strict. History for instance isn't just a bunch of facts and dates, it's the stories of every individual interwoven into a single tapestry. Those who find history most interesting seem to be interested in either the things of the time period or the people.

The two applications have a real effect on our daily lives. Those who do not consider the views of others limit themselves. What would happen if a popular socialite and a tech savvy nerd/geek were to work together and help each other? The one is better with people while the other is better with technology. Those two could easily be the ones behind some awesome events as the tech and social engineering aspects of the events are both taken care of, repeatedly. That's just the start.

When dealing with conflicts, remembering to tolerate people having bad days, misunderstandings and so on will do wonders for you. As a person used to internet forums, I've had discussions that were arguments to the other person, or where they were just having a bad day and I was the final straw. One of my favorite sayings is, "life happens" and the reason is that bad days will come. We should be willing to assume the person was pushed to, and beyond, their limit.

I've been told repeatedly that life is not black and white. Patience, consideration and benefit of the doubt are good things to me, "white" if you will. Jumping to conclusions, not listening and reacting without care are not good things to me, "black" if you will. Together these pieces make a mural of varying shades of gray. There is selfishness in every action we make and some good in them too. The reason is that no person is wholly one or the other. This is part of humanity that we need to remember if we are to be tolerant, and to truly understand tolerance. It's also easily forgotten.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Tools, Tune-ups and Testing

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 23:11:00 +0000

As typical for an INTJ, I like to make my processes more efficient. To be honest, I'll redesign the process before working on the project. Why, because the process affects the project. The less time focused on the tools and process problems means less wasted time and more focus on the project goals. This is true for both education and games.

Most of today I've been going over the possibility of making Fire Fox act like Flock. There is a lot I like about Flock, but some things I miss about Fire Fox. So, I looked at my tools, started doing some tune-up work and now am testing some of that work. For this post I am using Scribefire like I used Flock to post Social Gaming and Learning. Honestly, I like Scribefire more than Flock's blogging tool, though neither seems to have a way to create and save blog post templates. However, Scribefire has a "notes" feature that could be used to save the template.

Anyways, the point is that wonderful tools in a general sense can be horrible tools in the personal sense. I've blogged about Iteration and Prototyping, and linked to articles that touch on using the right tools. Well, this post is specifically aimed at using the right tools.

While looking for add-ons to Fire Fox I installed and uninstalled some multiple times. The initial settings are always something to look at when picking up a new tool, or add-on in this case. What I found was that some of the add-ons were not well suited to me without customizing the settings. One color codes the tabs, but starts out as just randomly coloring, rather than site based color coding. A little customizing and I now have URL based color coded tabs. That customizing process is akin to an initial tune-up, but that doesn't mean it will always be working great for you. That's when more tune-ups can help. Organization systems are prone to this. In programming there is even a name for it, refactoring. Tools also have this problem, as they commonly have settings and options to customize them to you. Thus, as you change over time, the settings may need to change to better fit you.

The way to figure out when, and what kind of, tune-ups are needed is testing. That's what I'm doing with this post, to test the the new tool I've installed. At this point it seems to be doing fairly well, and like I said, I like it more than the blogging tool in Flock. I'm a little curious about what will happen when I try to publish this, but till I try I won't know. My guess is that it will work, since the preview function said it published, and deleted, a version of this post to set up the preview function for this blog. If it does work, I think I'll pester some people like Jim Groom, Stephen Downes and others working with interesting tools for educational blogging, as Scribefire would work well for research paper type blog posts. This may become a favorite tool of mine for just that kind of posting.

Some of you might notice how this parallels iterative design practices. Seems to me that it's an iterative process refining your tools, their uses and their settings. That's just fine for me. I like experimenting with ideas that might improve how I do things, though one should be careful of volatile situations, for obvious reasons.

After all that, yes I know it's not much, I will point out one of the most important parts of dealing with your tools; take the time to give them tests and tune-ups. It seems obvious now, but when you are done with a project, or starting one, you should take some time for this. After a project is done you should have information from the project, and hopefully more coming in as user feedback, to work with. At the start of a project you should make sure your tools will be able to do the basics of what you want, and should be easy enough to create a mock-up with. If you can find somebody who knows what they are doing, and are willing to help, it would likely help your project to have them advise you on how to improve your process. Sometimes it is a little change, with no math based proof, that will improve team moral and the quality of the project.

One aspect that shouldn't be overlooked is user participation in the process. User feedback is better than technician, designer and developer feedback. Having real users try your project results will give you the most relevant testing results. They may not be very clear, but they will be relevant. This is especially important in the game and education fields, as user perceptions and results are the main focus.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

The Candle Problem Of Pen And Paper

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 20:20:00 +0000

Levels and experience are possibly one of the worst things for creative play. If you haven't watched the TED Talk by Dan Pink on motivation, you should, or this post will not make as much sense.

http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.html

For a while now I have been playing with some concepts for tabletop game designs for play and to help writers. This was inspired by the help of random content generators. If random content could help with the blank canvas problem, maybe there was more that could be done. The content generators weren't up to the idea I had as is, but a flexible framework for exploring possibilities based on die rolls, now that had possibilities to me. So, I started looking into the changes needed to create a tabletop role-playing game for writers.

I mention this because there are times where I had to completely redesign the basic direction of the systems. This was centered on motivators without the intention. As I watched the TED Talk for the second time I realized the connection between my design efforts and the results of the Candle Problem. Motivation was a part of it, but I had yet to see the scope of it.

To pull this together, let's look at the reason I dropped levels, experience and "balance". Levels and balance are like the box and holding the tacks. Experience points are the rewards that push functional fixedness ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_fixedness ). Most of the skills, feats, abilities and other things are combat rules. That means the presented function is combat. The rewards come from combat for the most part in most games with levels. So, to encourage a more varied type of gameplay, levels, experience and such were dropped for a more realistic modeling style. You want it, build it. Sometimes there is a master and an apprentice working together, which might throw off the balance. The result is the stereo-typical D&D/d20 style games has a group of similar level, mostly same level, characters as a group that focus on fights.

Don't get me wrong here. I like a good fight in a game, but that style of fight is only sometimes good. Since I like to play odd characters, like a defensive swordsman/diplomat/medic, I've come across the limitation of most well known systems. What did he do in a fight? Attack, defend, move? He was careful and used his brain. This kind of character pushes for a more interesting and creative experience. He doesn't blindly walk into the traps, enrage NPCs without forethought and so on. Such characters are also a PAIN to create using standard rules, unless they are specialists or stereo-tpes. That particular example actually require GM approved alteration and almost excessive use of house rules to create. Simply put, they don't fit well with the levels and balance of the game.

While it is entirely possible to create an amazing, interesting and deep gameplay with the combat focused rules, that doesn't mean the system encourages that kind of play. The different systems each have their own flavor. Some are amazingly versatile and some are niche games. So, how you present the system, how the system works, what's defined by the system and so on affect how the players and GMs deal with your game. It's just like the two versions of the Candle Problem shown in the TED Talk. When all the pieces are laid out and it's a very mechanical problem, incentives and rewards work well, but when the cognitive and creative aspects are the more important the incentives are likely to be a hindrance.

System Does Matter: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/_articles/system_does_matter.html
Deliberation and Intuition: http://socialbrain.rsablogs.org.uk/tag/candle-problem/

There is a type of tabletop games, sometimes called story games, where the focus in on the interactions of the play with combat merely being another form of interaction. Fudge, FATE, PDQ, Travellers and probably HERO are such games. FATE has "aspects" of the character that have both positive and negative effect throughout gameplay, and are the main way to earn FATE points. Those points are used to do really cool stuff in the game. PDQ has "upshifts" which boils down to a roll bonus for "graphic, flavorful, and entertaining" description of an action. Both can be used in and out of combat. HERO actually covers contacts as a part of the system. Thus, the gameplay adapts to the individual game, and encourages immersion.

The other part is that the players play the way they do for the love of the game, story and characters more than anything else. Sure, some of the specifics may be due to the rules, but they normally don't get in the way of story so much as tweak it. Maybe your character costs too much for the HERO game, or the "aspects" don't quite work out for the FATE game, but those normally aren't horrible problems as much as changing a couple things. Perhaps your character just needs to be younger or less trained to fit. None of these are giant problems or fixes. Besides a character "fitting" the game, there is just taking the game through its natural course. Sometimes it's fighting, sometimes it's dialogue and sometimes it's something else entirely. Since there isn't a "fight to get experience" style to the games, the players are looking for fights when they want to get into fights. If they want their character to progress, this style gives fewer restrictions and rewards creativity.

This difference may not seem like much, but let's consider the way a person might attack another person in a fight. The combat oriented way a person moves into range and says they are attacking with a certain weapon, or other means of attack. The attack resolves and the game continues. It's not till you get creative that it becomes a lot of fun. Somebody using telekinesis to counter a rocket with say, a rock, now that's interesting. A medic who is trained in close quarters combat using the tools of their trade to face the opposition, that's interesting. Then there is the combat that is generated when combat isn't all about attacking the enemy directly. Hand to hand combat that goes beyond simple rule usage because you are trained in a particular fighting style adds flavor and alters the results.

Another thing is that if you really want experience points, it should be a reward for what you want to encourage in a way that makes sense. Say an archer is facing a dragon, with the aid of his/her party. The archer shoots a single explosive arrow into the dragon's mouth and blows out the dragons throat. How much experience is that worth? Seems like that should get a reward for creativity, but maybe that reward should be mostly gold, items and reputation. Maybe the experience should be earned for pulling that to save the party? Maybe there should be more experience for the grueling adventures and situation? Personally, I don't like the linear growth systems that are linked to game balance, because they do so many things badly. Who you are, and how you think affects how you grow, and how much, so personalities and approaches make a big difference.

Personality types have come up in my design attempts, but the reason I bring them up here is because of a question, "Does it work?" It's not in reference to personality types and profiling, but it's also a question constantly asked by the personality type I seem to be. Lateral thinking, creative solutions and such are commonplace for the personality type, by what I've read, and so there might be something to the personality type's approach to problems that could help everybody.

"INTJs are perfectionists, with a seemingly endless capacity for improving upon anything that takes their interest. What prevents them from becoming chronically bogged down in this pursuit of perfection is the pragmatism so characteristic of the type: INTJs apply (often ruthlessly) the criterion "Does it work?" to everything from their own research efforts to the prevailing social norms. This in turn produces an unusual independence of mind, freeing the INTJ from the constraints of authority, convention, or sentiment for its own sake."
- http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/academic/psychology/alt.psychology.personality/profiles/intj.html

The following three articles are wonderful at describing how to apply the concept. First is an article covering some common problems in Flash games. The second is about a project where game prototypes were created in under 7 days most of the time. The third is a Gamasutra article called "Practical Tips for Independent Game Developers". In all of them there is a sense of asking, "Does it work?" about each piece of the process and product.

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/GregMcClanahan/20090723/2561/Fatal_Flaws_in_Flash_Game_Design_and_Development.php

http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20051026/gabler_01.shtml

http://www.gamedev.net/reference/business/features/indieTips/page4.asp

More can be found in this direction in a couple posts I've made about Iterative Design.
http://blog.igenoukan.com/2009/07/parallel-prototype-iteration.html

http://blog.igenoukan.com/2008/10/iteration-and-prototyping.html

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

To Save, or Not to Save

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 05:22:00 +0000

I just read two blog post I found through the #gamedesign hash tag on Twitter. The two posts deal with saving in games and the implications of different ways to handle it. The first post advocates splitting up the gameplay and the saving system, while the second post says that it can be advantageous to put progress at risk between saves. The rest of this post will tell you where I stand on this, and might inform you on the topic.

When it comes to saving systems, I've seen of plenty of types and times where they've gone wrong. Watching somebody save their game AFTER making a choice that leads to a game over, on the second disc out of four, is something that sticks with a game designer. However, there are other problems like forcing a player to choose between playing for another 20 - 30 minutes or loosing the last 30 - 90 minutes of progress. Some might say that loosing a half hour or more of progress due to a couple mistakes is a problem. I tend to agree, but for very specific reasons.

The first kind of saving system is actually no saving at all. This kind is really only suitable for the kind of game you could play through in a single sitting. The difference between the two opinions in the two posts is evident even when there is no possibility to save. That's because the choice to have no saving for the length of time and possibility that the player will have to repeat most of the game over and over to beat it. How long is too long for this option? That question is at the heart of this matter.

If you have a saving system, it will usually have either pre-set or custom choices for when and what you can save. One of the simplest systems is password, or codes, that you earn through play that tell the game what state to start you at. In some ways the "saved game" is a more complex and automated version of that system. The original is strictly a pre-set when and pre-set what. If you wanted to get really technical ALL saving systems are like that, but for this comparison the pre-sets are very limited while the custom choices represents a wider variety. Since the codes told the game to load a particular state, such as the start of the fourth level, only the places you've fully beat are "saved" when you beat them.

From there the saving systems get more complex giving options. Perhaps you are allowed to save only at particular locations, from in a menu or maybe anywhere on the map. At those times/locations, you may be able to save what you've fully beaten, partially beaten, your inventory, money total, win record and untold other things based on the game. There are certain times, like during a complicated task, that you aren't likely to be allowed to save, or aren't allowed to save the progress in that task. Boss fights and some puzzles are like that for the sake of the gameplay. It doesn't work well to load a game you haven't played for a while and find yourself in the middle of a tough boss fight. However, this brings up the temporary save, which is basically an extended pause. You can stop there, and pick it back up later, but after starting you don't restart there again.

Honestly, I don't think progress risk should be a part of the weightiness and tension that gives a players actions value and importance. That reason is that the actions with value are usually tasks, as mentioned above. A boss fight is a single task the player is supposed to succeed at to continue farther. These task are what I think the author of the second post I linked to was talking about. Sometimes it is a level, and sometimes it's however much the player wants within reason. Mario games with a halfway point and finish are one example used that fits as a task. A saved game says how much has been beaten, but each level is a task with rules. You have to beat the level within a certain number of lives or restart, as a difficulty modifier for the task.

Not all games are made up entirely of tasks, which is what the first post seemed to be saying. Walking through a field, defeating endlessly respawning enemies and cutscenes aren't tasks like those mentioned above. Who cares when you save when outside of tasks? It's like being able to plat the paths between levels of the old 2D Mario games like levels. Beating the "levels" is accomplishing tasks, getting to those levels isn't a task in the original format. If you make getting to those levels tasks in their own right they become levels. At that point the gameplay takes a different tone. Perhaps it means you have to manually traverse the map lots of times. Perhaps it means that you gain free access to other levels, like the original gameplay already had, only with more levels.

The second post mentions game balance as one of the reasons to put progress at risk, but I find the two posts to be arguing the same point with different unstated assumptions and points of view. The first is from the angle of when there should be more opportunities to save, and the second is from the angle of when limiting those opportunities can help the gameplay and game design. Both acknowledge that limiting the opportunities to save "too much" is a bad thing. Finding the sweat spot between "too much" and "too little" is what balancing is for. Considering the medium and how the player is going to play your game is part of the balancing that the first article is stressing. On a mobile game, saving is important, because you may be playing for a short or long time. Like all other aspects of game design, what works best depends on what you are aiming for. However, outside of "tasks", which can be reasonably completed within a single sitting, it can be necessary to allow saving to prevent player frustration. Maybe that time is only in the menu and task selection screen, and maybe you can save at any time including during the tasks. Maybe you can't save between every task, though this is generally my suggestion as loosing progression through tasks you've already completed can frustrate and bore players, as well as make those parts loose their value to the player, but the big thing is to let your players save enough to make the gaming experience, dealing with the real world, fun.

Here are some quotes from the articles that cover what I said, probably more concisely that I did.

"Single-play sessions are difficult to design for, because exactly how long they will last is completely unknown." - 1st

"Simply, players should be able to stop playing a game at any point without fear of losing significant progress. To do anything else is to be disrespectful of your audience's time. It's absurd to require the player to wall off a section of their day to play your game." - 1st

"A game designer can promote player tension and create a sense of danger through challenging gameplay and the careful use of failure conditions and responses. When a failure condition is met the game will respond by penalizing the player in some fashion, often through the loss of progress. Thus, the player might be forced to replay certain parts of the game or be presented with an extended challenge as a penalty." - 2nd

"If having that save anywhere/anytime is problematic to the game's design, providing a single "bookmark" save slot that is deleted after it's loaded is sufficient." - 1st

"A reasonable penalty can make the game more challenging and exciting, but too large a penalty will lead to player frustration." - 2nd

"If you're forcing players to repeat swaths of your game as a consequence for failure, something has gone off the rails." - 1st

"We've all seen it. It's the save point just before massive, unskippable cutscenes that rolls immediately into a very difficult boss fight. It's the failure that forces you to perform the exact same series of actions again and again. These things don't make the game more challenging, they don't make it more interesting, they simply make the game more frustrating." - 1st

"It is the game designer's job to achieve the proper balance between creating tension and avoiding player frustration." - 2nd

The saving system is but one part of the game design that must work well with the rest to provide the best gameplay experience for the player. It is entirely possible to be respectful to the game design and the player, and we should strive to as that is how we cane achieve the best gameplay experience, where the gamed design and player combine to generate "fun".

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Social Gaming and Learning

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 01:26:00 +0000

I'm typing up this post in a browser specially made for social networking called Flock, and I generally like it. Playing with the features got me thinking about some of the things I've heard about concerning games and education, the social aspects of course.

First, there is the education, because that is what I've been hearing more social stuff coming from by way of informal forms of learning. I could see tools like Flock being used for courses and classes using social aspects of the web; Twitter, blogging, e-mail, maybe Diigo in the future.

Second is the possibility for "social gaming" though I haven't looked too much into it. I think there is great strides to be made in making games social activities, but to really do something with social games there has to be a way to do it. Flock is merely one example of the tools that are coming out that could be used to great effect.

There are possibilities, but I think the coolest part is the idea of a social networking dashboard. I'll admit that a part of me cringes at the thought of have my log in information stored in my browser, but I'm like that. I like the idea of being able to got online and just participate. Posting in all my online social communities, and having them listed out so I don't forget them. I'm like that too sometimes. There are a few things I would change, but these tools are in there infancy so I'll give them some time and see what they grow into.

Personally, I'd really like to see something like an e-mail dashboard that incorporates all the different APIs for popular social tools like forums, wikis, blogs, e-mail and feeds, only in a more co-operative way. Speaking of feeds, I wonder if that is really the way to go to make this stuff work; feeds and pings. How about forums thread feeds being used like blogs feeds are used? Wiki pages and so on now all seem to have feeds for changes and such, so it makes sense to me to build a feed reader that informs the user like an e-mail dashboard does. Add some multicategory/tag-based organization for all that stuff and it could be something really useful.

How could we use such a thing in our daily lives, as students, teachers, designers, developers, consumers, journalists, socialites and more? Or, better yet, how do we keep it all organized? See that's where the tag and category idea comes to mind. Tag it to organize it, and grab it when it's relevant. Having a business meeting? Tell the dashboard the right tags to lookk for and have it bring the links and accounts to you. Have a MMO group thing going on? Put in the right tags and find all those resources, friends and communication tools you have prepared for just such an occation.

Wait. I see a slight issue here, or is it? Normally you have to go and log into a service, use there individual systems for each item you want to have "prepared". However, if you have something like a dashboard through which you normally deal with your social services, and it also submits actions and content to multiple services as you want, it might not be a problem. How about the tag search looking through image collections, blogs, feeds and bookmarks you have on your social services? How might games and education use such a dashboard? I think there are definite possibilities.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Where to Next?

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 03:48:00 +0000

I was reading OLDaily, the August 30th "issue", and came across Stephen Downes reflecting on several things. Reading it I was surprised to read that he is "daunted by the scale of it", with it being, "some work of significance and relevance" and "what needs doing". The first thought to go through my mind, besides being surprised, was that I would really like to get him involved in my effort. However, all I know of to effectively accomplish that is to post this. Most likely he'll read this, based on his scripts that look for "@Downes" and such.

Now, before going any further I will quote his post and the comment that I couldn't figure out how to make on his post.

"Reflecting
Home from camping, getting ready for Ars Electronica, and after that, a very busy fall spent mostly at home in Moncton, I'm thinking about projects and directions and my place in the world. It's all OK, but I do want to begin producing some work of significance and relevance - things I feel have escaped me thus far. I have a sense of what needs doing, but am daunted by the scale of it."
- Stephen Downes, August 30, 2009

And here's my comment/response.

"I know the feeling. However, I would point out something. At least you have reputation and some sway with people. As a college student half-way through a CS degree, with no relevant paid work experience and trying to tackle both the problems in education and educational video games, I offer up this bit of encouragement. With a group of determined, creative individuals with open minds, almost anything is possible.

If we could get a few of us together without the current responsibilities getting in the way too much, something seriously worth while could be created. That was actually part of the reason behind Edubacon. With the right kind of people gathered together, discussing how to take the next couple steps towards ours respective goals, the distance can be covered one day at a time. That's why I started blogging about combining learning science and game design in the first place and continue to due so. That's why I convinced Jim Groom to help me create Edubacon. That's why I have applied for The Mind Trust's Education Entrepreneur Fellowship twice, and intend to again when I get the chance despite being rejected twice. Maybe we should talk sometime about how to get this stuff to happen, and maybe we can help each other overcome the obstacles we face.

Sincerely,
Steven Egan"

I've posted before about being unable to attend the normal conferences, though I was able to watch some of the Open Education Conference and participated a little via Twitter. The more I think about the current state of my life, the less likely it seems that I can do anything, until I remember that I am regularly doing things in unlikely ways. However, getting the people that have been known for years in their fields to listen to a college student seems a little hard to believe at times. I haven't been researching, working or something else in the field for years to gain experience. Instead I'm coming out of the blue and asking. Who knows, maybe that will be enough with what I've posted over the last year.

What I do know is that I would love to have a conversation with Stephen Downes, David Wiley, Gardner Campbell and a bunch of the other people I hear about in the part of the edublogshere that I pay attention to. As usual I am looking into some ideas I have to accomplish my goals, but without cooperation they are not likely to succeed.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

A Student's Cry: "When will I use this in REAL life?"

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 07:26:00 +0000

INTRODUCTION:
As a student and game designer I am trying to understand and solve the problems I face in education, and my life long learning goals. While I have my opinions and ideas for possible solutions, they mean nothing if teachers, students, policy makers and the general public are unwilling to open their minds to challenge themselves, their systems and their futures. I am but one person, and such cannot implement true solutions alone.

Economy is about flow with effects, and the flow of knowledge can have many, many effects. The flow of information is based on communication. There are more than one form of communication, and each has many possible problems. Those problems need to be addressed for the sake of students and the future. That's what this is all about; the economy of information and dealing with the question voiced in so many variations, by so many students. However, more than that, I ask, when will you use THIS in real life? A solution never implemented is as helpful as advice never heard.

THE QUESTION:
For years students have asked when a particular piece of information, a particular skill or way of understanding would possibly be used in real life. This is a question of value. The question asks about the value of what's being taught. Is there any reason to go through the unpleasantness of learning what's being taught? It also says that the students don't see a reason, want to hear why you think it is worth knowing or want to compare their own views with what you say. It's not enough to just share the information. It never has been, and never will be. Humans aren't that simple.

Merely having a goal doesn't generate motivation. Knowing in one's head that something is good for one's self doesn't always motivate sufficiently. There has to be a desire, a personal goal. For me, learning something fascinating or useful can be enough, because I desire to learn such things. However, the limit to my motivation in those situations is the limit of my desire to attain those goals. For many people, the question mentioned is a search for motivation. They are assessing whether there is a good, motivating, reason to apply themselves. While abstractness can help make an idea more flexible, it also distances it from application. How the abstract can be applied is where the motivation is likely to be found, because that's how personal goals can be reached.

THE PROBLEM:
The problem is not that people have reason to ask the question in the first place, but that the lesson hasn't been learned by those being asked. After being asked many times how to eat a particular food, it makes sense to change things around to help those asking. Then they might understand how to eat the food before they attempt it. However, an explanation without application doesn't work well for many people. I know because I've tried to explain ideas in this fashion. It doesn't work. Explanation without application is as bad, or worse than, application without information.

Let's continue with the food example. After putting up posters that show people eating the food, the owners might receive fewer questions. The reason is that the customers receive the information in a situation where they are interested, have the ability to try it and can easily review the information while making attempts. This is one of the reasons that video games are considered a good vehicle for education, because the difficulty balancing and in-game help specifically address this aspect of teaching and learning. If a person can't understand the game well enough to have fun, they aren't likely to play.

The only real difference in such a situation is access to quality materials when the content is useful. Some might point out textbooks, to which most students and some teachers might laugh, raise an eyebrow or make rude comments. Simply put, textbooks are not very good for the most part. There are exceptions, but those exceptions aren't used enough. Textbooks seem to have the most usefulness as reference materials, not teaching aids. Web based materials can be a big help, when they can be used for more than small quotes, and are actually of good quality, easy to use, have the information you need and you're allowed to use them.

THE MOMENT:
Rather than talk about a particular solution to the "problem", it seems more important to define the moment in which students learn. Since each student is different, it can require different stimulus and situations to bring about that moment. As stated before, I'm writing this as a student.

First of all there is a desire, for whatever reason, to be able to do or learn something. This is the push to grow and change in a way that allows you to improve. It's not always pleasant or comfortable, but it's a part of the moment. Normally this is called motivation. Both of the following links cover motivation in more depth.

http://edubacon.com/2009/06/08/weekly-special-motivating-learners/

http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/content2/Student_motivatation.html

There is also the situation, which consists of preparation and context. Preparation is the lead up in concepts, understanding and experiences that provide the learner with the mental constructs needed to "get" the new skill, concept or material. The context is made up of external things like surroundings, people and expectations that can help and/or hinder the process.

When the preparation, context and motivation all contribute to the process there is a good chance learning will occur. Yes, that is an oversimplification and no, I will not make any guarantees. This is a general description of the moment when learning happens. If the learner is not willing, it becomes highly unlikely they will learn. If they want to learn, there's a pretty good chance it can happen. To be able to build the new mental structure, behavior, they need conceptual building blocks. Without sufficient mental resources it becomes unlikely the student will learn. The surroundings, attitudes and approach can discourage and misdirect, or encourage and guide. That's about it, so far as I have found.

THE REALITY:
The goals of students and teachers don't match. It's much like the goals of game designers and game players not matching.

"#7 The Player Does What's Efficient, Not What's Fun"

That's the title of an article section that I will quote below. We could replace fun with educational, learn, or beneficial, for educational endeavors. Along the same lines, game could be replaced by class, curriculum, course or a handful of other terms. So, please keep that in mind.

"Your goal is to make a game that is fun. But somewhat contrary to intuition, having fun is NOT the goal of the player. The goal of the player is to conquer whatever the game throws at them. Fun is the expected byproduct of this endeavor. The player wants to have fun without having to seek it out.

The player will do what is most efficient and effective, short of doing what they perceive as cheating. Consider a side-scrolling brawler where the player has two attacks. The first attack causes the character to leap into the air, dive down onto an enemy, grab him, spin him around, then toss him into a group of other enemies, knocking them down. A developer could put quite a lot of time into tweaking this maneuver, and have lots of fun executing it during playtesting. The second attack is a simple punch.

But here's the problem – the simple punch deals five times the damage. Why would the player bother using the former attack when the punch is so effective? "Because it's so much fun!" the developer would interject. Then why are you not forcing the player to use it?

We've all played a game like this. We're having lots of fun using a bunch of really cool attacks, abilities, maneuvers, etc. Then we find the infinite ammo rocket launcher that kills everything onscreen instantly, and the game is suddenly less fun. But why? We could always choose to put the weapon away. The problem is that manually handicapping ourselves within the game's rule structure is not fun either.

When testing your game, play it to win. Don't play it to have fun. It's your job to make sure that the two overlap.

There are exceptions to this, of course, where players will just mess around with a game to have fun rather than to progress. But the players who reach this point of exception are the people who are already hooked into your game. It's the new players who need to be won over. Force them to have fun, whether they like it or not!"
- http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/GregMcClanahan/20090723/2561/Fatal_Flaws_in_Flash_Game_Design_and_Development.php

Basically, the goal(s) of the people who create the system is/are the means to the users achieving their own goal(s). As such, the stuff used to achieve educational goals should be created with the goals of students in mind. Most are aiming for the grade, to get a degree, to get a job, to live a financially stable life, among other goals. Sure they may be interested in learning and understanding the topic, but the larger system values the grade, as evidence of content mastery. Unfortunately, learning is NOT the primary goal of a student, it's getting good grades.

While some students really want to learn, they won't need special treatment near as much if the means of getting a good grade is actually showing content mastery. By forcing the average student to learn to succeed, the students who want to learn are likely in a better position to succeed.

If students need to do homework as practice, reward it accordingly. What's the point of practice? The point is to do the action repeatedly, because it makes it easier to remember and gives experience. Accuracy is nowhere in the value of practice. Instead, it's all about participation, so rewarding participation makes sense. A little participation grade and quality feedback is the format I have seen as the most effective model for practice homework.

"De-emphasizing Grades

Emphasize mastery and learning rather than grades. Ames and Ames (1990) report on two secondary school math teachers. One teacher graded every homework assignment and counted homework as 30 percent of a student's final grade. The second teacher told students to spend a fixed amount of time on their homework (thirty minutes a night) and to bring questions to class about problems they could not complete. This teacher graded homework as satisfactory or unsatisfactory, gave students the opportunity to redo their assignments, and counted homework as 10 percent of the final grade. Although homework was a smaller part of the course grade, this second teacher was more successful in motivating students to turn in their homework." ... "Mistakes were viewed as acceptable and something to learn from.

Researchers recommend de-emphasizing grading by eliminating complex systems of credit points; they also advise against trying to use grades to control nonacademic behavior (for example, lowering grades for missed classes) (Forsyth and McMillan, 1991; Lowman 1990). Instead, assign ungraded written work, stress the personal satisfaction of doing assignments, and help students measure their progress."

Just as a note, ungraded assignments like this also give a great opportunity to understand the less standard students. If a note explaining why the assignment wasn't done is just as acceptable as the ungraded assignment, student - teacher communication becomes a bigger part of the class structure. Similar notes could also be made a part of all class work. To make this more effective, I'd suggest passing the notes back with a response.

"Design tests that encourage the kind of learning you want students to achieve. Many students will learn whatever is necessary to get the grades they desire. If you base your tests on memorizing details, students will focus on memorizing facts. If your tests stress the synthesis and evaluation of information, students will be motivated to practice those skills when they study. (Source: McKeachie, 1986)

Avoid using grades as threats. As McKeachie (1986) points out, the threat of low grades may prompt some students to work hard, but other students may resort to academic dishonesty, excuses for late work, and other counterproductive behavior.

Motivating Students by Responding to Their Work

Give students feedback as quickly as possible. Return tests and papers promptly, and reward success publicly and immediately. Give students some indication of how well they have done and how to improve. Rewards can be as simple as saying a student's response was good, with an indication of why it was good, or mentioning the names of contributors: "Cherry's point about pollution really synthesized the ideas we had been discussing." (Source: Cashin, 1979)

Reward success. Both positive and negative comments influence motivation, but research consistently indicates that students are more affected by positive feedback and success. "

...

"Be specific when giving negative feedback. Negative feedback is very powerful and can lead to a negative class atmosphere. Whenever you identify a student's weakness, make it clear that your comments relate to a particular task or performance, not to the student as a person. Try to cushion negative comments with a compliment about aspects of the task in which the student succeeded. (Source: Cashin, 1979)"

Another note, making it clear what is wrong and how to correct it is a big part of this. If you are willing to help fix the problem, it helps you, the teacher, come across as caring about the student's success. I've had teachers refuse to help, and it normally comes across as, "I don't care." If the student needs to figure it out for them self, tell them that and give what assistance you can without giving away the answer.

"Avoid demeaning comments. Many students in your class may be anxious about their performance and abilities. Be sensitive to how you phrase your comments and avoid offhand remarks that might prick their feelings of inadequacy.

Avoid giving in to students' pleas for "the answer" to homework problems. When you simply give struggling students the solution, you rob them of the chance to think for themselves. Use a more productive approach (adapted from Fiore, 1985):

* Ask the students for one possible approach to the problem.
* Gently brush aside students’ anxiety about not getting the answer by refocusing their attention on the problem at hand.
* Ask the students to build on what they do know about the problem.
* Resist answering the question "is this right?" Suggest to the students a way to check the answer for themselves.
* Praise the students for small, independent steps.

If you follow these steps, your students will learn that it is all right not to have an instant answer. They will also learn to develop greater patience and to work at their own pace. And by working through the problem, students will experience a sense of achievement and confidence that will increase their motivation to learn."
- http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachtip/motiv.htm

THE SYSTEM:
As a game designer I occasionally look for good articles on game design. Recently I've bee looking more into tabletop role-playing games. Dungeons & Dragons is likely the most well known example, but it is only one type of such games. Depending on the people you talk with, the game could be described as the precursor to hack & slash video games to a wonderful collaborative storytelling game. However, there is something to note about any game, the system and rules matter. In one article I found ( http://www.indie-rpgs.com/_articles/system_does_matter.html ) the author describes three types of goals for the experience and three types of mechanics to achieve those goals. With that in mind the author concludes that the worst thing you can do is try to be all things to all people, though I disagree on that point.

The reason I disagree is that a system could give the tools to adapt the system to different types of goals and mechanics. Such a system would be an adapting system that allows for customization as needed, without the experience and skill needed to do it your self. Sure, you still have to figure out and choose how to customize the system to the situation, but that's why there is a human in charge. In a tabletop game it's the Game Master, and in the classroom it's the teacher.

Personally, I find the current mainstream education systems to be much like D&D. You pick a major (class), with the option of changing it, and then you follow the strict rules of encounters, be they classes or combat. With the large focus of D&D rules being on combat, the style of the system influences gameplay in that direction. In school, the grading and recognition systems influence the education experience in the same way. If most of your system focus is on taking the user through a particular set of actions, they will learn to depend on your leadership, or reject it. If the focus is collecting points, they will optimize how they collect points based on their goals.

One of the current big things in games is "sandbox" style gameplay. It has functional rules that define capabilities of objects in the game and the players ability to affect them. The name comes from the behavior of a sandbox that children play in. It becomes their space while they are in charge. If you want to learn more about this direction, I suggest reading this article http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/4081/the_history_and_theory_of_sandbox_.php . Such a system is made to encourage creativity and exploration of possibilities.

One of the downfalls in plenty of games is the User Interface, the UI, the tenuous connection between the user and the experience. This is also a sore spot for students and teachers, from what I've observed, when it comes to education. In another article ( http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/4110/upping_your_games_usability.php ) it had this at the beginning, "Games that are hard to control or that mystify users by not providing useful or sufficient feedback are pretty damn frustrating to play." The question about when the content of a class will be useful is a request for feedback to deal with being mystified, so it seems relevant, at least to me. On a similar note, there are a lot of design elements that can give clues to what a person should do including, but not limited to, the UI. More about these can be found in this article: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/4115/no_more_wrong_turns.php .

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Topplenomics

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 01:05:00 +0000

The term came to mind after reading some comments on the article linked to below. This is the "why free doesn't work" thing that people hype as well as why businesses and groups of people become unwieldy at high numbers. Simply put, they become top heavy. The few supporting the many overwhelms the few and leaves the many without service.

Article: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/138/who-needs-harvard.html?page=0%2C0

Earlier I was going to watch something on YouTube and stopped because of the slow loading. Why was it slow? Probably because of the number of people accessing it right then. Too much traffic.

This is a classic problem. Something is widely acclaimed and a large number of people want to partake. The problem is that it can kill a business or effort. If many people try to get something from you, but you only have enough for a tenth of them, 90% go away unsatisfied. The unsatisfied remember and tell others. There isn't much reason for them to return till their is proof you can satisfy them.

Yet that's only one possible result. Some pick themselves up, or can handle the flood. However, if they don't maintain a solid base, they can become top heavy. A little mistake and they fall.

So, why am I talking about this? Well, in both education and entertainment this has been a problem. People want to be the top and get all the rewards, but that makes for a bad dynamic. As lot's of people selfishly clamor to the top, there are those who get stuck supporting the greedy. Makes me think of a cartoon where a bunch of characters are climbing over each other till they are floating in the air or just a couple are trying to hold them all up. Then, they all come crashing down.

One merely needs to look at the economic issues to see the truth of topplenomics. People taking from others became successful by scamming and stealing, only to get caught and cause the whole system problems. The economy does best when people are spending and getting paid in a balanced way. It mirrors a guideline I learned in a business class. It's best for a business to be at about 80% capacity. Why, because there is something to fall back on and still plenty to keep going with. Higher means it's time to increase your capabilities, and lower means you should consider what to possibly change.

Personally, I would rather see a bunch of the groups share some of their resources, lower their costs and be able to offer better services for a lower cost to their consumers. This is a big goal of the initiative I mention a fair bit on this blog. Content is normally a one time cost, but services have recurring costs that both fuel and stifle economies. For instance several tutoring services could support a single educational content system. Several indie game development teams could work together to distribute small games through each others sites. If it helps you to send people to potential competitors, it becomes less of a competition and more of a collective effort. The key is to have several to many small groups connected. They can work together for big project and separately for small projects. For instance, selling games could become the business and making games could stay the fun side project. Not only is this idea sustainable, but it also removes business from art, service from content.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

What's Real In Games and Education?

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 05:02:00 +0000

To sum up my answer, it's people, communication and reactions. The rest is a contrivance to facilitate communication with, and getting reactions from, other people. Assessment ( http://edubacon.com/2009/06/15/weekly-special-assesment/ ) is a way to communicate a reaction to another person. Games use communication with other people to generate certain reactions, as does a school environment. They can be used to motivate ( http://edubacon.com/2009/06/08/weekly-special-motivating-learners/ ) , engage people ( http://edubacon.com/2009/06/23/weekly-special-open-engagement/ ), keep people involved ( http://blog.igenoukan.com/2008/11/keeping-people-involved.html ) and many other things. The term Edubacon ( http://edubacon.com/ ) refers to the reality in the synthetic situation we call education.

I know I've been quiet for about a month on my two blogs, and this is a part of the reason why. I'm working on improving the way I run Edubacon and maybe get some more interaction. Based off of the materials I've posted, and posted by others, I'm making an article/post/e-mail to send out to many potentially interested people like teachers. This post is to let you all know I'm still working on this stuff and to give a pre-view of what I'm working on.

During the process of creating what I'll be mass e-mailing, I did some research on the internet. Yes, I know it's a big surprise for a college student and blogger to do internet research, but stay with me for a moment. I wanted to check out search results for the name I'm thinking of using. See, nothing too crazy. In doing so some interesting articles and blog posts came to my attention that I would like to share that go right in line with my efforts.

First is an article about being too focused on the results, and not enough on the process. In essence it say that students are people too, so teachers should treat them like people with real feelings and personalities. In effective communication it's important to remember to listen, actively listen, to the other person. Not paying attention to the feelings and personalities of his students, the professor found that he was driving his students to hard to make sure they got the point right then and there.

Article: http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/569446

Second is another article that deals with professors and pushing their students too far, this time to the point of shedding tears. Its big point is to look at a student more like how a parent looks at their children. Rather than looking at all the faults and things that could use correction, that professor thinks teachers should remember the potential of each student. Just because the student has faults, isn't the best, needs a lot of work, is going to fail your class, doesn't mean they are less worthy of your time or less in need of your help.

This article has comments after it, and one of them jumped out at me. 'Although I agree that grades should be based on performance and we should lead them to good work habits, I don't see that I'd teach them anything by kicking them in the teeth while they're down and telling them "that's life, suck it up." How does it diminish us or coddle them to take a few minutes to listen to their stories, sympathize, and give a bit of advice, particularly if they are going to fail the course? Ask them a few questions nicely "Why do you think you are having trouble with the material?" and their answers might lead you to the advice they need (eg. "the counseling center has help for test anxiety" "You might consider switching to another major such as ____"). This is higher education not boot camp.'

Article: http://chronicle.com/article/When-Students-Cry/47540/

Third is an article that covers how a school was handling the real life scheduling problems of their student athletes, and the reaction it received. Their solution was to give the 2% of the students who are student athletes a priority when registering for courses. The article doesn't take a side. but instead shows different sides of the situation. I really like the quote at the end of the article, as it acknowledges the reasoning while saying there may be a better way. It's a common problem with solutions. Just because there is a legitimate reason for the proposed solution doesn't make it automatically the best solution.

Article: http://www.michigandaily.com/content/2008-11-10/student-outrcy-ignited-athlete-priority-registration

Fourth is a blog of a student teacher from a couple years back that I encourage you to read. While it only lasts a semester, it has many interesting insights into the world of a person teaching and learning at the same time. While not always comfortable, the reactions from the students was enough to encourage that teacher to discount the teachers and staff who seemed like discouragement.

One of the students, in an assigned letter to the teacher, said this at the end of the course. "Throughout the semester, it seemed like you didn't want a day to go to waste. You always had us writing, analyzing, or discussing. I really appreciated this because it made me feel as though I was going through the same emotions and experiences of the characters. All the analyzing made them come alive. Your standards took a while getting used to because many of the English teachers I've had in the past went easy on me. I also wasn't used to having so many essays, but your comments were so helpful that I think my writing has improved significantly. You pushed us hard, but I'll be mature enough to say that is was worth it . I really hope that you teach 11th grade English next year or even AP English." To be honest, I wish I could find a way to make contact with that teacher. She sounds like a very interesting and insightful person when it comes to teaching. I'm glad she blogged about her experiences. Now I share them with you.

Blog: http://teachingtochangetheworld.blogspot.com/

The fifth and last of the interesting things I've found in researching the title I'm considering deals with the big question I'll be tackling, "When will I use this in real life?" Its a Q&A site with a question specifically about when algebra is used in real life. While the other things I've mentioned deal with the people, communications and results in a more traditional way, I focus on this question of usefulness as a part of motivating student to care about learning the material. The fact the the question is well known to occur says a lot about how schools teach students in general. That's also why I intend to send the completed article/e-mail with a bunch of links for those interested in finding out more. There are some great answers found to the question that should be shared with teachers to share with their students.

Q&A: http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/52324.html
Q&A: http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.why.math.html

In general, I'm intending to pull from the materials I have easy access to and to find more to use in what I send off. By using a small article with several pointed, dedicated links I'm hoping to get some of the teachers to read more into this. Maybe some will share the links or forward the e-mail. Maybe some people will come and get involved in the discussions about improving education. If you want to share some information with me, I welcome the contribution. This is likely to include the summary posts I've had planned for Edubacon for months, so there will be credits for those people who have contributed to that effort.

Some people might wonder why I care so much and refuse to stop when my ideas don't work. To put it simply, I've dealt with bad teachers that meant well, bad situations beyond my control and still have retained my love of learning. Then there are the results of the current approach to education that is doing horrors to our future. One business teacher I had said that he saw the lack of focus on business ethics in business classes as part of the reason for the economic problems we're going through. Education matters, a lot.

Then there is the way people generally view school, learning and education. A necessary evil is not what should be thought of, though there will be some work involved. It's like sports and video games where there are more and less pleasant parts, but on the whole it should be considered a good thing, not a bad thing. One of the comments on the second article I mentioned that if you get to know your students you should be able to see the problems coming a mile away. While I'm not sure how feasible it is for teachers with a lot of students, or for game designers to implement through code, there is something to be considered in the concept. The more about the person you know, the more real and human they become to you. That information enables you to more easily treat the person like a person rather than a thing.

In line with the Weekly Specials posted on Edubacon, I'll give some more links I've found relating to this material. If you know of other good resources, please pass them on to me. While I may not be blogging much at the moment, I am working on a few projects, including this article/e-mail that I will post in parts and/or the whole.

Links and Descriptions:

http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachtip/teachtip.htm
- It's a wonderful page of links that I intend to explore. It's huge. The few pages I've looked at so far have all had really good content.

http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/content2/Student_motivatation.html
- This is a breakdown of motivation beyond what I've done. Very interesting and informative. It should be very useful to most people who have reasons to motivate others.

http://www.nwrel.org/request/oct00/textonly.html
- This is an official booklet on motivating students. While haven't read it yet, the promise of "a discussion of research and literature pertinent to the issue" is enough reason for me to be interested.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Parallel Prototype Iteration

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 01:08:00 +0000

The iterative design process is to analyze, design, test and repeat. Normally the testing process is through prototypes. When I think of prototypes I think of the Experimental Gameplay Project, which had individuals prototype game ideas in one week. I thought it would be interesting to take the successful methods of the Experimental Gameplay Project and put them into each round of iteration.

The basic idea is that rapid prototyping with the parallel splatter model could lead to more thorough testing of design ideas. This is the difference between normal iterative designing and parallel prototype iteration. You want a map system, then have an iterative cycle of map systems on the main prototype. With at least a few to test and analyze, the team should have plenty to analyze and learn from.

While I take this in a game development direction, that's no limitation. Playable can be replaced with functional. This is a general idea for creating better results.

STEPS:
So, now that I've introduced the general idea, I'll get to the step processes and breakdowns.

Analyze:
This is a team activity including diagramming, discussions and determining the next design goals for the group. Not a whole lot to this, besides the facts that it is the only always team step and that it should be kept seperate from the design step. That's to make sure all the results are analyzed and understood by all the team members.

Design:
This step can be either a team, group or individual step, depending on what design goals are to be tackled. Either way, this step decides the ideas that are to be made into prototypes.

Test:
This is the heart of the concept, where the prototypes are made and altered. Yet, the explanation of why will come later.

UNIQUENESS:
Perhaps it doesn't sound sound too impressive right now, but the iterative process and prototyping ideas explain the effectiveness of those part already. No, it's not the process that is so interesting to me so much as the emergent patterns.

Main Prototype:
In rapid prototyping it makes sense to have a main set of build versions as the main prototype. These incorporate the selected code, features, interaction, gameplay and such from the parallel prototyping rounds. This means that each iteration you start with the culmination of the efforts so far, and don't need to redo the whole thing from scratch every time.

Branch Prototypes:
These are all the prototypes that are not a part of the main prototype version history. Some would say these are a waste of time, but these are not just "wasted effort", they are very useful as I tell more about later in this post.

Parallel Prototyping Round:
This is a round of iteration that focuses on designing and prototyping several ideas. That's to generate creative options with the data needed to make informed design decisions.

Updating Round:
Using the selected prototyped ideas from parallel prototyping rounds, the main prototype version is updated. This is much like refining the integration of selected idea(s) into the main prototype.

BENEFITS:
There are several benefits to this method theoretically. They are a combination of those normally found in iterative designing and parallel development.

Version Tree:
In most open source projects I know of there is a branching history of versions. The many branches give fall back options, code and feedback to be incorporated into the project as needed. Sometimes you will find that a major decision needs to be changed. The branches help speed up the process.

Information:
More so than either concept on it's own, this combined idea should give mounds of information. In fact, that's the reason for having the idea as a written up idea. As a formal design approach it should be able to handle the information that comes per prototype success, failure or in-between. Comparative play testing of versions and ideas, development feasibility and more come naturally out of this process.

Something to Show:
Iterative prototyping and rapid parallel prototyping both give results, but this combined method delivers playable prototypes of the ideas that didn't make it in. It encourages keeping each and every individual prototype created during the project. When people want to see what you have done, project progress, why you made a choice or anything else where a playable prototype would be helpful, you have them.

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan

Assessment in Games and Education

IgenOukan@gmail.com (Steven Egan) — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 04:58:00 +0000

As the person behind Edubacon, I figured I should keep my word a post about the topic of the week, assessment. While I made another post for the topic ( http://blog.igenoukan.com/2009/06/designing-for-play-creativity-and.html ), this one is a recap of some related posts of mine.

Happy with Perfection?
http://blog.igenoukan.com/2008/09/happy-with-perfection.html

I see several problems with a 100% mentality to grading. This post covers some of them, and a possible solution or two. Part of the problem is parents, but part of it is that a higher difficulty can lead to lower grades, when there is more learning in the higher difficulty. Homework, testing and grade representation all have their parts in this. Expanding our assessments to include a variety of good qualities can give us a better result.

Iteration and Prototyping
http://blog.igenoukan.com/2008/10/iteration-and-prototyping.html

Perhaps not the first thing to come to mind for assessments, it is relevant. First is that each prototype is different, like a person's skills and approach differ after learning.

Pointless Obstacles are Bad
http://blog.igenoukan.com/2008/10/pointless-obstacles-are-bad.html

This is a little more directly related in that assessments shouldn't be limited by classes. Testing into and out of classes is an example, but not the limit. If a person has taken the course once, why should they be forced to take the course again just to retest on the curriculum. Perhaps this would make colleges and universities seem more like testing and accreditation institutions, but having to pay for the class and redo all of it just to prove capability doesn't make sense except as a business.

Testing Before Teaching, Why?
http://blog.igenoukan.com/2008/12/i-find-following-article-to-be.html

Defending pre-tests really wasn't my initial intent, but it was hard not to in response to a particular article. One example that even the author conceded was testing out of a class, but there is so much more to a well given and used pre-test. It can help teachers and students. One of the big points is it not counting towards the course grade. Are the results important? Yes, but a pre-test that counts for the grade isn't over material covered in the course. It has other uses.

Logical Content Breakdown
http://blog.igenoukan.com/2009/01/logical-content-breakdown.html

This one is about the content of the assessments, and the order. In the example covered in the post, splitting up the content differently and using a slightly altered explanation would make learning the curriculum very different from the current norms, for that topic. To further facilitate that kind of content breakdown and the learning that comes from it, assessments and self-assessments should be given. Yes, I just said that self-assessments should be given. It's a matter of getting students to see their mistakes, shortcomings and weaknesses. The content breakdown can make learning the material easier, but assessments can help learners see how well they have learned the different parts.

Metalearning: Learning How You Learn
http://blog.igenoukan.com/2009/04/metalearning-learning-how-you-learn.html

The big idea is that it's good to know how you learn, and so it is good to learn how you learn. To do that requires assessing the results of learning attempts, and comparing them; assessing how well and learning method works for you. Trial and error is the default method for this. Helping students understand themselves as a learner has many possible positive effects. One is giving students the knowledge to craft good learning environments and select good learning resources for themselves. If you don't know how you learn, experimenting while being graded can seem like a very bad idea.

Skill Based Grading
http://blog.igenoukan.com/2009/04/skill-based-grading.html

I'm a game designer, and this is one of the points I like in gameplay when there is to be improvement; skill based assessment. With skill based gameplay, difficulty is matched with skill levels to provide a suitable difficulty. Well, what if the debriefing of results and skill based results found in some games was used in assessment? I think it would be interesting to have achievements, multiple measurements and the ability to retry after learning from previous mistakes.

Automated Tests

No, I didn't miss a link. This isn't a post I've made before, but rather a record of my thoughts after going through those posts. I think one of the keys to improving assessments is to make them less costly to give and take. Automated tests are a possible solution, if done well. Randomly generated problems will always be able to be solved by the right software, but they can be used as non-graded self-assessments and graded assessments when other tools are not available.

I know that many proponents of improving education are for opening up the resources normally available to students, but the keys to automated tests are providing the resources and not allowing alternative resources. Basically it becomes a game. How well you do at the game shows what you can do, but if you have a tool that solves the problems for you, it's pointless to use. Yet it is also not logical to test a person in a way that removes information that would be available to them in the real deal merely because they don't remember it. So, if the assessment was on derivative calculus as a whole, it might start with picking the correct names of the rules, putting the equations together correctly, using them in problems and correctly identifying the abnormal cases. It would probably take a while, but everything needed is there and requires the learned skills and knowledge to succeed. I think most people would enjoy assessments more if it was less like being put on trial and more like exploratory play. Isn't education supposed to be a safe time to make mistakes before going out into the real world?

Have fun, spread the word and tell me what you think,
Igen Oukan