Course Description

Learning Outcomes

At the conclusion of the course, students will be able to …

1. Select and evaluate computer games for specific learning objectives.
2. Design an engaging educational game with appropriate goals, challenges, rewards, and feedback.
3. Rapidly prototype game ideas, for testing and promotion.
4. Create a simple educational game/simulation that can be played on the web.

Course Delivery Mode and Structure

Classes will be held in-person and simulcast on Zoom. You will get the most out of the class, and will likely earn a better grade, if you come to all of the classes. However, if you are sick or unable to attend in person then you should attend class online. There may also be circumstances that will require me to hold the entire class online; be sure to check your Stony Brook University email before coming to class, so you can avoid an unnecessary trip. The link to the class meeting is available on the class' Brightspace page. See the Zoom for Students page (https://it.stonybrook.edu/services/zoom/students) for more information on how to download and use this application.

Office Hours

Office hours will also be conducted both in-person and on Zoom. You must sign up for office hours on my calendar (Google calendar appointment slots). You can also set up a special appointment with me by sending email. Please be on-time as appointments are only 15 minutes long.

If you need to contact me, the best way to communicate is through email. If you use Brightspace’s email tool from the course site, it will automatically include your full name, course name and section when you send me an email. Please allow between 24-48 hours for an email reply. Your Stony Brook University email must be used for all University-related communications. You must have an active Stony Brook University email account and access to the Internet. All instructor correspondence will be sent to your SBU email account. Plan on checking your SBU email account regularly for course-related messages. To log in to Stony Brook Google Mail, go to http://www.stonybrook.edu/mycloud and sign in with your NetID and password.

Technical Assistance

If you need technical assistance at any time during the course or to report a problem with Brightspace you can:

• Phone: 631-632-9800 (client support, Wi-Fi, software and hardware)
• Submit a help request ticket: https://it.stonybrook.edu/services/itsm
• If you are on campus, visit the Walk-Up Tech Support Station in the Educational Communications Center (ECC) building.

Course Materials

Readings for the course will be from the recent literature, and may be found on the Brightspace site.

You will be required to sign up for a Comic-BEE account and a Scratch account; further information will be provided on Brightspace.

Course Requirements

• Game Projects - 54%
  Over the course of the semester you will design and develop 2 projects: an educational simulation and an educational game. Both will be presented in-class.
   
• Homework Assignments - 18%
  Homework assignments are done independently. They are designed to help you to develop and complete your game projects. Even if you think that they are incomplete, it is important to hand them in on time so that the professor and your classmates can give you constructive feedback.
   
• Participation - 28%
  Discussions, with the professor and your peers, are an essential part of your education. You will be expected to read the assigned papers prior to the class meetings. If you need to miss a class for some reason, you can make up the in-class activity by writing a short essay. This is found under Assignments.

Advisories

• Critical Incident Management: Stony Brook University expects students to respect the rights, privileges, and property of other people. Faculty are required to report to the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards any disruptive behavior that interrupts their ability to teach, compromises the safety of the learning environment, or inhibits students' ability to learn. Faculty in the HSC Schools and the School of Medicine are required to follow their school-specific procedures. Further information about most academic matters can be found in the Undergraduate Bulletin, the Undergraduate Class Schedule, and the Faculty-Employee Handbook. 
   
• Student Accessibility Support Center: If you have a physical, psychological, medical, or learning disability that may impact your course work, please contact the Student Accessibility Support Center, Stony Brook Union Suite 107, (631) 632-6748, or at sasc@stonybrook.edu. They will determine with you what accommodations are necessary and appropriate. All information and documentation is confidential.
  
  
• Academic Integrity: Each student must pursue his or her academic goals honestly and be personally accountable for all submitted work. Representing another person's work as your own is always wrong. Faculty is required to report any suspected instances of academic dishonesty to the Academic Judiciary. Faculty in the Health Sciences Center (School of Health Professions, Nursing, Social Welfare, Dental Medicine) and School of Medicine are required to follow their school-specific procedures. For more comprehensive information on academic integrity, including categories of academic dishonesty please refer to the academic judiciary website at http://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/academic_integrity/index.html
  
  
• Course Evaluation: Each semester Stony Brook University asks students to provide feedback on their courses and instructors through an online course evaluation system. The course evaluation results are used by the individual faculty, department chairs and deans to help the faculty enhance their teaching skills and are used as part of the personnel decision for faculty promotion and tenure. No individually identifiable data are ever reported back to the university or instructor. Students who have completed previous evaluations can view all faculty ratings at: https://classie-evals.stonybrook.edu/

My Own Advice

Think of me as your cranky client. There may be times when you disagree with what I say. You may think that some things are a matter of opinion, or that you are right and I am wrong. Just remember that I am the one giving out the grades. When I make a suggestion, be sure to listen, because it may have an impact on your final grade.

Start your assignments and your project early. That way if you have trouble, you can get help in time to finish your assignment by the due date. This will also help you to avoid a last-minute crunch in the lab.

Don't be afraid to ask questions. If you don't understand something, it's likely that your classmates don't understand it either. Raise questions in class. If you need further explanation, come see me during office hours. If you can't make my office hours, send me email. Be sure to do this before you get hopelessly lost.

Work with other students. I do not mean that you should copy each other's work (which will not be tolerated). Rather, you should learn from one another. If you can't figure out how to make something work, see how your colleague did it. It is also useful to discuss different ways of approaching a problem.

Please let me know as soon as possible if you anticipate any problems with this class. If alerted to them early on, I may be able to accommodate your needs.

Schedule

References

Aldrich, C. (2009). Virtual worlds, simulations, and games for education: A unifying view. Innovate: Journal of Online Education, 5(5).

Den Haan, R. J., & Van der Voort, M. C. (2018). On evaluating social learning outcomes of serious games to collaboratively address sustainability problems: a literature review. Sustainability, 10(12), 4529.

Devine, J. R., Quinn, T., & Aguilar, P. (2014). Teaching and transforming through stories: An exploration of macro-and micro-narratives as teaching tools. The Reference Librarian, 55(4), 273-288.

Jones, CS (2019). Visual Storytelling with Pixar’s Scott Morse, October 2019. Available online at https://community.wacom.com/us/visual-storytelling-with-pixars-scott-morse/

Greitemeyer, T., & Osswald, S. (2010). Effects of prosocial video games on prosocial behavior. Journal of personality and social psychology, 98(2), 211.

Hilton, M. , & Honey, M. A. (Eds.). (2011) Learning science through computer games and simulations . National Academies Press.

Kafai, Y. B., & Burke, Q. (2015). Constructionist gaming: Understanding the benefits of making games for learning. Educational psychologist, 50(4), 313-334.

Papadakis, S., Kalogiannakis, M., & Zaranis, N. (2017). Designing and creating an educational app rubric for preschool teachers. Education and Information Technologies, 22(6), 3147-3165.

Paraschivoiu, I., Buchner, J., Praxmarer, R., & Layer-Wagner, T. (2021, October). Escape the Fake: Development and Evaluation of an Augmented Reality Escape Room Game for Fighting Fake News. In Extended Abstracts of the 2021 Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play (pp. 320-325).

Resnick, M. (2007, June). All I really need to know (about creative thinking) I learned (by studying how children learn) in kindergarten. In Proceedings of the 6th ACM SIGCHI conference on Creativity & cognition (pp. 1-6).

Resnick, Mitchel, et al. “Scratch: Programming for All” Communications of the ACM, vol. 52, no. 11, Association for Computing Machinery, 2009, pp. 60–67.

Shaffer, D. W., Squire, K. R., Halverson, R., & Gee, J. P. (2005). Video games and the future of learning. Phi delta kappan, 87(2), 105-111.

Silva, F. G. (2019). Practical methodology for the design of educational serious games. Information, 11(1), 14. doi:10.3390/info11010014

Nick Wingfield, All the World’s a Game, and Business Is a Player (2012). New York Times, December 23, 2012.

Yee, N., Ducheneaut, N. and Nelson, L. (2012) Online gaming motivations scale: development and validation, Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '12), 2803-2806.

Zagal, J. P., Rick, J., & Hsi, I. (2006). Collaborative games: Lessons learned from board games. Simulation & gaming, 37(1), 24-40.