Teng Learning Technology

Reflect on your experiences this semester as they relate to the following: ·          Game design and its connection to learning theories and instructional design; ·          The relationship between immersive learning and your professional/academic goals/research interests; ·          Where you think gamified and immersive learning is headed in the future; and ·          Lessons learned to support your academic progress as a learning technologist. This maymester has been quite a ride.   I felt that this was one of the most exciting topics I have learned at this school.   This class has reinforced my understanding of the learning theories.   While other courses have emphasized the behavioralist, cognitive, and constructivist theories, this class seems to elaborate on the importance of immersion, social...

Day 12 Emerging Possibilities We find ourselves a long way from the days of the first text-based adventure games and simple knobs of the Pong console. Looking at the technological options we currently have, where do you anticipate gaming technology heading in the future? What will become the dominant platform for development and how will players interface with their games? Predicting the future is difficult.  When pong first game out, who would have imagined smartphone games, MMORPGs or FPS.  The day 12 videos point out emergent technologies related to haptic feedback, and virtual reality.  It would seem that graphics still improve in quantum leaps every year.  The explosion of smartphones and social media have shown us a rise in free to play, play anywhere and everywhere type of games. I do believe there are some trends not mentioned in this class.  The gaming industry is gaining a reputation for overworking its developers. (Schreier, 2016)   It ...

Day 11 Creating the Roadmap While many consider the  Game Design Document  (GDD) to be an essential element of the development, there are some that feel it is not necessary. As you move into the creation of the GDD for your proposed learning game, what aspects of it do you see and relevant, and which do you feel may not be. Also, in what ways would you modify the GDD to improve its effectiveness within an evolving educational sphere? Provide more than just opinion. Back up your reasoning and perceptions with examples and works. As someone who is scatterbrained and disorganized, planning ahead is something I often resist, but really need. When it comes to game creation, the Game Design Document (GDD) is the most important part of the planning cycle because it is the Bible of what is being created. (BlenderWaffles, 2017).   While there are many GDD templates out there, there is no GDD version that works perfectly for every game (BlenderWaffles, 2015). In large tripl...

Write a reflection about your personal reactions to moving into your first development efforts in both Scratch and Portal 2. Which environment are you excited to work in - 2D or 3D? What is the draw of your preference? Which role do anticipate being more challenging - level design or programmer? What aspect of this area do you feel will require the greatest effort and why? What study disciplines might use this technology? Your response should be at least 300 words. Delve deep and reference examples and resources where possible. I am excited to create a game for this class.  While I think it would be fun to develop for portal 2, for this shortened maymester class, we are just developing for the scratch platform only.  As a software developer, I created a Pacman game I have made for the coding bootcamp I took this summer in just HTML, CSS, and Javascript.  It seems like scratch would greatly simplify the process giving me more time to think about design and less for code...

Write a reflection about your impression of the outcomes of the Games Motivation Profile surveys you took, and the Game Player Archetype Quiz. Consider your experiences with games and gameplay, and your reactions to the outcomes. ·         Do you think the outcomes were accurate? ·         Was there anything about the outcomes that surprised you? ·         How did your Gaming and Board Game Motivation Profile compare? Your response should be at least 300 words. Delve deep and reference examples and resources where possible. My relationship with gaming has always been contentious.  The Pleasure or Pain Article discussed two types of gamers. A promotion game player is one that is motivated by achievement, while a prevention-focus player focuses on loss aversion (Ozturkcan & Sengun, 2016).  From the perspective of my whole life, I am very much a prevention-based, achievement-based individua...

Write a reflection about your perception of what should be considered an educational game. Explain your reasoning and provide some insights into how you developed this position. Your response should be at least 300 words. Delve deep and reference examples and resources where possible. While I have a broad and inclusive definition of a game, I tend to have a narrow and exclusive definition of what an educational game is. According to our textbook, there are three basic criteria for games: “ (a) Interactive rule set governing play (b) Conflict to drive play (c) A win scenario/condition.”  (Warren & Jones, 2017) A fourth criterion is required to make a game educational: does the game effectively teach learners? Growing up, my parents wanted me only to play educational games. I argued in less eloquent terms that Tetris was a game because it taught some problem-solving skills.  Tetris may help a person improve their spatial reasoning and eye-hand coordination, but there ar...

Consider the materials covered. Were there any games of gaming innovations that stood out to you? Why? Share a bit about your favorite games both traditional and digital) and provide some insight into why they appeal to you? Would you consider any of these to be educational? Your response should be at least 300 words. Delve deep and reference examples and resources where possible. Watching through the videos chronicling some of the most popular video games got me thinking about an article I read in LTEC 5210 on Yokoi’s Theory of Lateral Innovation. While cutting edge technologies can catalyze the creation of new games, it is often games that use or perfect existing technologies that become the most memorable games. World of Warcraft’s game engine was outdated when it came out, and yet it is the most popular MMORPG of all time. StarCraft was not the first RTS out there, but it certainly one of the most popular. Yokoi’s theory states that designers should spend more time focusing o...

Write a reflection about your experience with games, simulations, or immersive environments as an instructor, a designer, and/or learner. It should be at least 250-300 words. Delve deep. How do you understand the differences between entertainment and learning game design and environments? Why are you interested in learning games? My parents installed a lot of “educational games” on our family computer when I was growing up.   Like many students of my generation, I played Oregon Trail .   I learned some landmarks I would have never learned, and I became familiar with the name of diseases like dysentery or cholera. I also played more obscure games like the “ Super Solver ” Learning Company games Such as Spellbound or Midnight Rescue .   I don’t have any proof they helped or hurt my education. I am pretty sure they were better than regular video games. I am not sure if the games were as effective as my parents reading to me, or helping me with homework. Some of the...