TPACK Quest

  Over the past few weeks I have been steadily progressing to completing all of my badges, symbols of my course achievements.  The first one I wish to discuss is my badge Cup of Wisdom.  The Cup of Wisdom is rewarded for completing all of the weekly online tasks that help to support my background knowledge with various technologies.  I think my favorite activity within the Cup of Wisdom was the PBL Badge, simply due to the large amount of choice we had in online teaching tools to explore.  I personally loved learning about the timeline tool Timetoast and the trading card tool.

 

  The second badge I wish to discuss is the Genius Hour Badge.  We have talked a lot about genius hour over the past few weeks, but getting a chance to experience is something I'll never forget.  I will defiantly look into using the concept of genius hour in my classrooms going forward, as I think it is an excellent opportunity for students to express their interests and get some self-motivation.  I also really benefited from my own genius project looking into role-playing games in the classroom.  This is a topic I might not have researched otherwise, which is a shame because I got a lot out of this activity.

  The third but potentially most important badge I have received is the Professional Order of TPACK Badge.  This involved coming to class consistently, tweeting regularly, and collaborating in all in-class learning activities.  This badge represents my professionalism, collaboration and dependability.  As a teacher I think it is a good idea to try and incentivize student punctuality and participation.  This badge does a good of keeping students accountable. 

Genius Hour Learning Object

  Earlier in one of my weekly reflections I had mentioned the creation of a learning object for my implementation of role-playing games in the classroom.  This learning object was a timeline of the events during the opening year of World War One using the website Timetoast.  You can find the timeline for this here, I would personally recommend viewing it in list mode rather than timeline as it looks neater.  As I said I would use this tool to have students make their own timelines for specific historical events.

Genius Hour TED Talk

  I have finally finished my TED talk all about my genius hour project on how RPGs can be used in the classroom.  I have embedded the Youtube video of my TED talk below.  I unfortunately filmed it with a big of a cold so my voice is a little scratchy.  Still I enjoyed this whole genius hour project I did.  I'm still considering doing continual updates on it, discussing how RPGs can be used within the classroom.  Perhaps devise some more activities or ways of organizing the class around RPGs and post them.  I would of course appreciate any constructive feedback on my TED talk or on any of my other posts for my genius hour.  I hope this was as enriching of an experience for you as it was for me.  Enjoy my TED talk!

Genius Hour Week 4: Reflections and Final Thoughts

Over the past few weeks I have thoroughly enjoyed researching the topic of role-playing games (RPGs) in the classroom.  I have found many resources to help explain how others have done it, and really enjoyed coming up with my own lessons or methods of integrating RPGs into the class.  For this post I will be reflecting on my experiences with this project, some implications of my project, and in general going over some things I may have missed.  

Due to trying to be concise I have glossed over some aspects both of RPGs in general and their application in the classroom.  I thought it might be helpful here to briefly go over some RPG mechanics and give my own personal recommendations for those interested in entering the hobby just for fun or bringing it into a classroom.  As I have stated RPGs are all about creating your own character and playing in a group of other people who have done the same.  There is one person, often called the game master who unravels a narrative and presents options to players and their characters.  In most RPGs when players commit to an action they often roll dice to determine the outcome and the result is often modified by the character’s stats.  This ends up adding some controlled randomness and necessitates improvisation both for players and game masters.  That is pretty much it for core concepts while trying to be as concise as possible. 

I will now take the time here to provide some personal recommendations and suggestions for RPGs that are good introductions to new players, or would make for an excellent classroom tool.  First and foremost I have to bring up Dungeons & Dragons (D&D), as it is by far the most recognizable RPG out there.  While I think this might help introduce educators to the concept of RPGs I believe that most editions of the game are too cumbersome for a classroom of students grades 1-8.  It is a little too rules heavy to allow for that ease of entry and student buy in.  You want a system that will not frustrate or confuse any of your students.  This is why I had recommended Dungeon World in my last post.  The rules are simple and encourage player creativity and ingenuity in resolving issues.  My second recommendation might come across as bizarre sounding, but if you’re a fan of the movie WALL-E you’ll love it.  The RPG is called Engine Heart where the players create and play as their own robots.  I compared this to WALL-E because these robots are not big or powerful, they’re simple robots designed usually for one or two basic functions, like a robot that collects and incarnates trash, or a robot that greets people.  The rules are quite basic and easy to pick up, it does involve dice but only 10-sided dice.  Besides that the game system is free, you can get a pdf of the rules and character sheets from their websites.  I think this game could work particularly well for younger grades, and might be a great interactive activity to discuss human impact on the environment, much in the same way the movie WALL-E did.  These are just some of the easiest, most accessible, or popular RPGs I could think of.  I might expand this blog further as I discover and read more RPGs that could work for a classroom or go into greater depth reviewing and describing the RPGs I have mentioned and the uses for them in a classroom.

So now that we are at the end of this project, what have we learned and what implications for learning did we discover?  First and foremost I think that this activity highlights the need to engage students in interesting and novel ways.  Children have a natural drive to play, and I think we would be missing out as educators if we did not harness this drive to play to also help them learn.  I think that as a teacher if you are planning on integrating RPGs into the classroom you have to do so in a way that is engaging and inclusive (make sure it’s something that all students can enjoy and participate in) but above all helps to reinforce traditional curricular lessons or incorporates curricular standards into play.  I believe that RPGs can help to teach and reinforce knowledge on social skills, arithmetic, probability, reading, writing, media literacy, problem solving, and critical thinking skills.  There are some issues that educators or those familiar with RPGs may raise, two of which being time and size.  RPGs are often very time intensive activities, and are usually designed to be played with 4-8 people including the game master.  In a classroom setting the best way to account for the issue of time is quite simple.  Just plan out a lesson that would take the appropriate classroom time to complete and weave the RPG around that.  The issue of time with RPGs is something that as educators we deal with for every lesson and is something that we plan and account for better with experience.  The issue of size is something more complicated.  If you have a class of 30 students that far exceeds the recommended players for an RPG.  This is where the teacher must get creative, either by creatively working in RPG elements into traditional lessons thus having it function little differently than a normal classroom.  Or have students break off into groups and decide a student who can keep track of rules along with a character, like a smaller scale game master.  Or ideally but perhaps unrealistically have students simply take turns, this method would of course be a larger test of patients and may eat more time.  

Overall I don’t think there is any one right answer of how to bring RPGs into a classroom; you have to find the method that best works for you and your class.  Experimentation is necessary.  I just hope that I managed to get some people thinking about this topic, got people curious, and got people wanting to explore the potential of RPGs in education.  One of the final things coming up for this genius hour project will be a TED talks.  It will nicely summarize my studies and research on this topic, along with my methods, reflections, and where we can all go from here.

Genius Hour Week 3: Final Results

Over the past few weeks I have spent my time just researching and collecting data on the subject of how to integrate role-playing games (RPGs) into classrooms in a meaningful and engaging way.  Well I am happy to say that those weeks of research and planning have paid off.  Due to my readings I am going to present two models of how one can use RPGs in a classroom.  Why two?  Based on the readings I have mentioned earlier in my blog there is a divide between simulation games and role-playing games in classrooms.  You can go back to my previous blogs on my genius hour to be filled in on all the details, but it’ll suffice to say that simulation games are meant to deal with real world events with a competitive edge, while RPGs are fictional and cooperative.  You can read my past posts to know why I have a problem with these definitions.  So here I will attempt to offer an activity which tries to combine the best aspects of simulation games and RPGs, while my second one will be a model that can be used to try and integrate RPGs into all aspects of the classroom throughout the school year.  My hope with this is that the first model will serve as a nice introduction to teachers, while the second one will be a more fully integrated approach.

My first model is more of a unit long activity designed for a grade 10 twentieth-century Canadian history class.  As stated earlier it is a combination of simulation and role-play games, designed to encourage cooperation, competition, inform students of real world events and people, and allow students to take on a specific role and character.  The foundation for this activity is the board game Diplomacy which was published back in 1959.  Diplomacy is a board game for ages 12 and up, and focuses on the themes of alliances, negotiations, and strategy of World War One.  I have taken a picture of the game board, the rule book (only a 23 page manual with many examples, illustrations, and diagrams), the pieces in the starting positions, and the individual player maps which you can see below.  

 Michael, Feagan. (October 12, 2016). Diplomacy Game [Photo].

The game is broken up into 4 main turns (diplomatic phase, order writing phase, order resolution phase, retreat and disbanding phase) which after getting used to it may take students about 10-15 minutes to finish all 4.
  

This is how I would integrate this game as both a simulation and role-playing activity into a classroom.  I would divide the students into groups based on one of the seven countries in the game (Britain, France, Germany, etc.) and each student would take on a specific governmental role with their own specific responsibilities.  An example of this would be a student in the French group being assigned the role of Head Diplomat, it is his/her responsibility to go around and negotiate during the diplomatic phase with the diplomats of other groups and report the progress back to their group.  Or another good example would be a student who has taken the role of a German general, and it is their responsibility to write orders for the armies.  It is the teacher’s job to act as a mediator or “gamemaster” to manage time, collect and read orders, resolve issues, and make and enforce the game rules when necessary.  So far this is a strong simulation game, with lots of competition, a little cooperation within groups, dealing with a real world event, and the teacher takes on a small observational role.  Where this gets a bit more interesting is that students should not just take on the role of diplomat or general, but rather should take on the role of the historical character who occupied that position.  For example a student who takes on the role of a British general is not just a British general, but rather could be playing the role of Arthur Currie.  As part of an assignment tied in with this activity the teacher would give the students a historical actor who occupied the same role they are in.  Then have them research that person so that they can present their findings to the class, but also to best embody that role during play.  I think the best way to do this is by using a trading card web tool such as the one found here to highlight the background and motivation of their historical person that they’ll play as.  Other web tools and learning objects can be tied into this lesson as well, such as timelines.  I have gone to the effort of making a timeline of the beginning of the war in 1914 here, and students could potentially make their own using this tool.  Perhaps one based off of the real history of WW1 and another based on the sequence of events of their game to help illustrate the cause and effect of historical events.  I think this could be an excellent assignment that integrates simulation and role-play elements into a unit while engaging students and encouraging self-motivated research.  I think a similar activity could be continued for a grade 10 unit on World War Two using the popular game Axis and Allies, but that’s a whole different idea for another time.

Now I must discuss how RPGs can be integrated into a classroom for more than just one activity or unit.  This was a hard question to find an answer, not because there weren’t any answers, on the contrary it was the opposite.  There were so many different ways that teachers have integrated RPGs into their classrooms.  Some teachers used them for a lesson or a unit, much like my previous example.  Some teachers like Nix took RPG elements like characters, experience, and loot to inject into their entire class.  Other teachers like Kade Wells took the whole system of Dungeons & Dragons and integrated it as a classroom activity.  There are therefore a lot of different methods of integrating RPGs into classrooms and I strongly encourage anyone who is interested to do some research and come up with a model that works for you and your class.  For me I would introduce the concepts of role-playing to students through language arts and drama to help gauge interest.  This would probably take the form of students making characters in a fantasy setting using any of the wonderful RPG systems that are out there.  I am personally partial to DungeonWorld for its open license and easy to access rules.  I would then try to develop all of my lessons from other subjects such as math, geography, or science to feed back into this game.  This can be done by using examples from the game, such as probability questions for math based on dice and numbers found in the game, or a geography lesson where students are encouraged to craft a mental map based on places travelled in the game.  Or a simpler way of integrating it would be to offer game rewards (such as character experience or items) for students who completed traditional math, history, or geography work.  However, I must state that I would try to be as flexible as possible with how it is integrated.  I would use either the lesson specific model discussed earlier, or the fully integrated one, it depends on the class and what your objective is.

I hope this has been illuminating for you all.  This project is still not quite done yet.  I will have a TED talks on my findings and one last post reflecting on the implications of RPGs in classrooms to come, so keep an eye out.

Genius Hour Trailer

After working with and gaining some familiarity with Powtoon I decided to make my genius hour movie trailer using it as well.  I quite enjoyed the process as it allowed me to get more familiar with the service and try and refine some things that were done in my genius hour introduction.  Down below you can view my genius hour movie trailer, which introduces my concept and goals for my genius hour project.  Keep in touch because I will soon be posting my last two genius hour blog updates and a TED talks on my genius hour all about role-playing games in the classroom.

Genius Hour Powtoon Intro Movie

Over the past couple of weeks I have been working with Powtoon to make a introductory movie to the concept of genius hour.  Below you can find the result of this effort.  It is a brief video with some music and narration.  I think Powtoon can be an excellent tool for making engaging presentations, something that teachers should look into for lectures and as a tool for student presentations.  Over the next week I will also be posting a Powtoon movie trailer for my own genius hour project.  So keep an eye out for more updates to my genius hour project about role-playing games in the classroom, and enjoy the video.

Genius Hour Week 2: Finalizing Research

For this week, as planned in my timeline, I have continued with my research and have tried to narrow it down and be more selective.  For this week I have found two interesting blogs that deal with role-playing games (RPGs) as a learning tool in the classroom.  Both of these I feel like will be a welcome addition to the sources I currently have, adding some more real world examples and experiences.  However, after last week’s post where I discussed an article’s definitions of simulation and role-playing games, I find it necessary to briefly provide my own definition of what a role-playing game is.  

For me a role-playing game is inherently focused on the development of an individual character, the cooperation of that character with other people’s characters, and someone taking on the role of a dynamic and involved storyteller who unravels the world and events to players.  The problem I have with the definition of RPGs discussed last week is that they do not necessitate a fictional or fantastical setting.  I have read and played many RPGs that have set themselves in highly realistic settings.  For example there is a game where you play as Mormons in the American Wild West called Dogs in the Vineyard.  So I find the distinction of RPGs being fictional to be a little antiquated with the state of thriving indie RPGs filling niche settings and markets.   Now that I feel like I have adequately discussed this I will move on to discussing some new sources.

There were two blogs that I researched and wanted to highlight with this post.  The first one I wish to discuss focuses on a sophomore world history teacher at Native American reserve in Montana named Taylor Nix.  You can find an article talking about Nix’s classroom here and Nix’s blog here.  Nix states that his class was plagued with apathy and wanted to do something to liven up his classroom and engage his students.  Nix began by having his students take on the roles of characters who were adventurers seeking information about different civilizations throughout history.  His students were divided into one of two groups, created characters, and they chose classes or roles to fill within their group.  Once a week Nix would post quests at the back of the classroom, some were to be done individually and others to be done in pairs.  These quests would yield experience and items which would make their character more powerful.  This all culminated into what Nix describes as a “raid” at the end of the unit.  This “raid” was organized like a Jeopardy game with five columns of increasingly difficult questions.  The two teams would them compete to win the raid by answering questions correctly as prep for a test, and after the question was answered correctly the characters could fight a culturally specific monster using the results of dice to determine a winner.  After the raid Nix had the students fill out a “field report” about their adventures, which in reality was just a standard test.  For me this is an intriguing concept, I like how Nix was able to really integrate the concept of an RPG into just about every aspect of his class.  The rewards that were given for completing quests and raids would serve to entice the students and to make later raids easier.  And since there are two groups for the final raids, but the quests are often done individually, there is a certain pressure to do well on the quests so that you may best help your group during the raid.  There is no mention of how these quests or assignments were graded, but I think it might be an interesting idea to award better gear or more experience as part of getting a better grade.  

The other article I have does less to discuss the details of how to integrate RPGs into the classroom and is more about how it affected students as an extra-curricular activity.  Brian Foglia is writing about how Dungeons and Dragons or D&D (a highly popular RPG which has been around for decades) has helped students in his non-profit democratic school in South Jersey.  Foglia discusses how his school’s D&D club has helped students develop skills including creativity, memorization, social skills, arithmetic, probability, reading, writing, and as Foglia highlights as the most important, patience.  I find that this article does an excellent job of highlighting the skills that children would be exercising from an average RPG session.  There is also one thing that Foglia writes that I find really resonates with me:

“I hope parents will come to accept that their child’s natural desire to play is a boon, not a hindrance, to his or her education. It’s the drive to seek fun and novelty that motivates us to grow and flourish. Games are educational because they inspire us to delve into new environments and challenge ourselves — what better way to spend their time at school?” 

I hope that this genius hour project can help and illustrate this fact.  In the coming days I will be posting a model that will help to explain how I would intend to implement RPGs into a classroom.  After spending some time thinking on the subject I am considering making two models.  One would be a blend of simulation and role-play games, something that might be more accessible for some educators.  It would be an activity that would likely only last one unit.  The other model will be a stronger commitment to integrating RPGs into the classroom throughout the year, something similar to what Nix and Wells have done with their class.  I look forward to writing about it and hope that the results will be illuminating for you all.

Tech Class Reflection

So it has been four weeks of classes now in my tech class and thus far I have learned a lot.  We had the chance to use a lot of different tools so I thought I would take the time to talk a bit about my experiences using them and which ones I liked and how I would use them in my classroom.  Obviously the big class activity has been genius hour.  I've talked quite a bit about my personal genius hour on this blog but I'll give some of my thoughts on the activity overall.  I think it's a great way of engaging student's interests, making a inclusive activity, and relinquishing some responsibility to the students for their own learning.  I feel like for a classroom say for example of grades 7s or 8s, it would be best to show them a lot of examples and clear step by step instructions of what is expected of them for their genius hour project.  If you're interested in genius hour and how it could be used for your class or in a class with low access to tech then check out this helpful guide here.

As for some specific tools that we used, I've loved both Google Slide and Google Form.  I've been aware of Google Slide now for a while but have just never got around to using it, so I'm quite grateful that this class finally gave me the incentive to try it.  For me it is basically an easier and more accessible version of Power Point.  As a teacher I love the idea of Google Slides as my students wont have to be reliant on a specific program to finish their presentations but can just sign into their Google account at home to work on it.  As for Google Form it seems an excellent tool for teachers.  It essentially allows you to quickly make tests or quizzes for your students online.  You can even embed videos and images if they're relevant to the quiz.  I made a simple multiple choice quiz based on the story book book Thank You Mr. Falker.  You can find my quiz, along with a story time reading of the book here.  Google Forms also allows you to easily track the answers your students give as well as the average and questions frequently answered as incorrect. 

Overall I've really appreciated my time spent in tech class when it comes to all these useful tools I've been exposed to.  There were of course many resources and tools that we have used in class, far too many for me to list them all and talk about what I liked about all of them.  Just real quickly and briefly I'll say I've enjoyed using Powtoon for its ease of use and high quality presentation, Popplet for how easy and clean it makes flow charts, and Timetoast because I love timelines.  All I can say is that I'll remember them all I would wholeheartedly recommend them to any teachers.  I personally look forward to getting the chance to use them in my own classes. 

Genius Hour Week 1: Initial Research

Research on the topic of role-playing games (RPGs) has been going well over the past week.  I found some good sources in the form of written articles, videos, and podcasts.  There has clearly been a lot of research and attention put on this topic, and so far I have only just scratched the surface.  One particular example stood out to me which was in the form of a podcast.  It was a Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) podcast (interview starts at 21:50) where the hosts interviewed Kade Wells, a Grade 9 Texan teacher who used D&D to teach reading, writing, and critical thinking skills in his language arts classroom.  Kade Wells went on to present his experiences and his findings to the 2015 World Literacy Conference in Austria.  Wells goes on to explain the significant boost in the confidence and performance of his students which he attributes to the active use of D&D in the classroom.  Although I could not find an article or a transcript of Wells’ presentation, he does go into detail discussing how it worked in his classroom during the podcast.

I have also learned some serious distinctions some people make when discussing games in the classroom, specifically the differences between simulation games and role-playing games.  Csenge V. Zalka in their thesis presented to East Tennessee State University outlines some key differences.  Firstly simulation games are based in real world events or scenarios while RPGS are focused on fictional or fantastical settings.  Secondly simulation games are often constructed to be done in groups competitively while RPGs focus on the individual character and how they cooperate with others to overcome challenges.  Thirdly the teacher when running a simulation game merely observes and facilitates, unlike in a RPG where they actively shape the narrative.  Fourthly with simulation games most of the information students need are provided to them, unlike RPGs which require more research and data management in preparation (Zalka, p.15-17).   

For the most part I agree with these general distinctions between simulation and role-playing games, however I must disagree with the first point.  There are many RPGs out there that deal with real world events and scenarios that contain all the same aspects of cooperation, strong narrative construction, and preparation.  The definitions and history of simulation games and RPGs offered in Zalka’s article will certainly be useful going forward.  This article also offers a few sample games which the writer says can be adjusted for grades K-12 (p.60-68).  I will read through each of these more closely to determine if they would work in a classroom.  

These were the two sources that most stood out to me in my week of research.  I found both to be quite informative, as Wells offered some insightful comments on his own experiences using it in his class, and Zalka offered a more detailed academic analysis on the topic.  For now these two sources seem excellent in informing my decisions as I go on with this project.  Over the next week I will continue to do more research and focus on narrowing down the sources I intend to use to help create my own method of integrating RPGs into the classroom.  I still have many questions, answers to which many not be easily found in articles.  Such as how does one run an RPG with a group of 30 people playing?  How can one successfully integrate the RPG into all subjects so it is not relegated to just history and language arts?  And how do you best get students to buy into the concept?  I hope to find the answers to these questions in the coming weeks, and likely come up with more questions to ask.  I’m looking forward to seeing what the final product might look like.