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  1. Fengfeng Ke
  2. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  3. Florida State University
  1. Gregory Moore
  2. Doctoral student
  3. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  4. Florida State University

Earthquake Rebuild

NSF Awards: 1318784

2015 (see original presentation & discussion)

Grades 6-8

This presentation introduces a design-based research project that examines how domain-specific learning can be intrinsically integrated in gameplay to foster the development of disciplinary proficiency while sustaining the playability. In particular, we examine the design of math integration in the quests of architectural design, resource allocation, trading, and building in Earthquake Rebuild, a 3D architecture game. This game aims to provide versatile representations and epistemic practices of mathematics for middle-school students.

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Discussion from the 2015 Teaching & Learning Video Showcase (13 posts)
  • Icon for: Kevin Brown

    Kevin Brown

    Facilitator
    Senior Research Scientist
    May 11, 2015 | 09:38 a.m.

    I have a 7th grader so this reminds me so much of Minecraft, which I assume is “educational” but am not sure! I’m wondering if Earthquake Rebuild “scaffolds” student learning through a progressive learning model by restricting or stopping gameplay when a student fails to demonstrate mastery of a basic math skill and provides some sort of on-the-spot instruction, or does it rely more on trial-and-error learning as a student progresses through the game (ala Minecraft) and then assesses student learning at the end?

  • Icon for: Fengfeng Ke

    Fengfeng Ke

    Lead Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 11, 2015 | 03:59 p.m.

    HI Kevin,

    Earthquake Rebuild uses game-log-based, Bayesian-network-oriented stealth assessment (SA) to track students’ math-related performance during game play. The help panel will present math problem-solving scaffolds dynamically based on the SA-based performance evaluation. The scaffolds will integrate learner self-control and adaptive support: The scaffold window is activated/presented when the learner’s performance in evaluation indices fall below threshold values, and the learner is urged to interact with the scaffolds (presented in both symbolic and iconic forms) and get gameplay-relevant rewards (e.g., time and material credits) by interacting with the scaffolds.

  • Icon for: Kevin Brown

    Kevin Brown

    Facilitator
    Senior Research Scientist
    May 11, 2015 | 03:49 p.m.

    In shifting the game to require rather than just allow mathematical input from the player, how difficult is it to maintain an interesting/engaging “gameplay” while still teaching the right kinds of math concepts in the right order? I can imagine that it would be very difficult to balance the two!

  • Icon for: Gregory Moore

    Gregory Moore

    Co-Presenter
    Doctoral student
    May 11, 2015 | 07:45 p.m.

    This is a major challenge. There is a balance we need to achieve between giving the player a lot of freedom and interesting choices and ensuring that they are achieving the learning outcomes. For example, how can we stop the player from spending their time trying to spell their name with the building tools and instead focus on the learning task? We could limit their actions or give them a message if we notice they aren’t doing the learning task, but that threatens the motivational benefits that a good game can provide. Telling a player they are playing the game wrong is frustrating, and not in a good way. At that point, why not create a word problem?

    To accomplish this, a lot of our meetings are focused on designing tasks that are intrinsically motivating. We need to create tasks that middle school students will be interested in for their own sake. This is why testing is so important. In our test sessions so far, we discover what the students want to do, what intended learning tasks they are completing, and which one they are not.

    In short, it is a hard problem that we solve by thoughtful game design and as much user testing as we can get.

  • Icon for: Joni Falk

    Joni Falk

    Facilitator
    Co-Director
    May 11, 2015 | 03:52 p.m.

    I enjoyed watching this video and hearing about next steps that you are thinking about given your current experience. It makes it clear that educational game design needs to be an iterative process. How do you test your game for educational impact? Is it being used in school? Outside? Still in testing phase.
    I think it has great potential as the topic will surely capture interest. Thanks!

  • Icon for: Gregory Moore

    Gregory Moore

    Co-Presenter
    Doctoral student
    May 11, 2015 | 07:58 p.m.

    We are still in the design phase, so we have not examined the educational impact yet. However, we have run a number of testing sessions with middle school students. The main purpose of these sessions was to determine how students feel about the game mechanics, what they enjoy about the game, what they don’t like, if there are bugs/poorly designed game elements that are getting in the way, and, most importantly, if our design is creating situations that are conducive to learning. With this information, we iteratively improved the game. User testing is an ongoing and important part of this project, both for improving gameplay and, in the future, for determining educational impact.

  • Icon for: Joni Falk

    Joni Falk

    Facilitator
    Co-Director
    May 11, 2015 | 03:52 p.m.

    I enjoyed watching this video and hearing about next steps that you are thinking about given your current experience. It makes it clear that educational game design needs to be an iterative process. How do you test your game for educational impact? Is it being used in school? Outside? Still in testing phase.
    I think it has great potential as the topic will surely capture interest. Thanks!

  • Icon for: Deborah Kariuki

    Deborah Kariuki

    Facilitator
    Computer Science Teacher
    May 13, 2015 | 01:25 a.m.

    I was intrigued by this video because the first thing I was the similarities to the famous popular Mine Craft game. Then I could see signs of the new phenomena that is going through schools now and that is gamification so as to motivate and engage students. As we know the best way to reach students is by meeting where they are and then challenging them to even go deeper in their ZPD. With this in mind I see you have a fascinating project here that gives assess to teachers to modify it for their own class which is always a plus. Currently I see a tool that will captivate students but I am not quite sure as to how the skills assessments will be in cooperated. It seems that it might take too much initial work from teachers to have a working tool for their classes. What kind of professional development/tutorial will the teachers need to get this tool up and learning for their own classroom? Have you done any field work for the teachers while conducting tests with the students? Thanks for this tool

  • Icon for: Fengfeng Ke

    Fengfeng Ke

    Lead Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 13, 2015 | 11:32 a.m.

    We totally agree that teacher input and participation are critical for any game-based learning projects. During the design/development phase, we have been inviting math teachers from a local school and a class of math teacher students from our college of education to review our design prototypes. One teacher in North Carolina has been field-testing our demo episodes in her class during the past semester. The formal in-field testing studies will be conducted this fall and next spring.

    At the same time, we are exploring the potential approach to extend Earthquake Rebuild as a participatory design platform, in which a non-programmer, teacher user can design and create a math-problem-based game level following the existing game episode template and the structure of exemplary math word problems. This approach aims to let teachers simply customize the parameters of a math-specific game challenge to create procedurally generated game levels.

  • Icon for: Deborah Kariuki

    Deborah Kariuki

    Facilitator
    Computer Science Teacher
    May 14, 2015 | 06:06 a.m.

    Excellent, it is certainly an interesting and innovative way of teaching math and I believe when more teachers learn that they can use your system without being hinder by not knowing programming then it will impact more teachers and students coming to the table and learning math in a very exciting way. Thanks for developing this tool.

  • Icon for: Fengfeng Ke

    Fengfeng Ke

    Lead Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 14, 2015 | 10:25 a.m.

    Thanks, Deborah!

  • Icon for: James Laffey

    James Laffey

    Professor
    May 13, 2015 | 08:24 a.m.

    Hi Fengfeng, It is great to see the progress you are making. Is Earthquake Rebuild available for download and playing….by that I mean can i get a copy to play with :)

    Also, you are embedding assessment tasks in the game, but are you also doing any forms of learning analytics to track performance in the game against the more discrete assessments. Thanks

  • Icon for: Fengfeng Ke

    Fengfeng Ke

    Lead Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 13, 2015 | 11:39 a.m.

    Hi Jim, great to see your comment! Our current demo episodes are available for download and play. I will send you the link if you send me an email :).
    The major performance track is the game-log-based, Bayesian network modeling. Currently game logs can be archived both in local machines and via server uploading. A middleware is developed to extract math-learning-related gameplay data, and Netica is used for developing and validating the Bayesian network models. In Earthquake Rebuild, there is also an internal scratch pad that enables and records students’ calculation and notation for math problem solving. Keywords searching and content analysis will then be conducted with the scratch pad content.

  • Further posting is closed as the event has ended.