NDLI: Theories meet realities: designing a learning game for girls

Content Provider	ACM Digital Library
Author	Winn, Brian M. Greene, Darcy Drew Heeter, Carrie
Abstract	Nongamers expert in interaction design, learning, girls and games, and art teamed up with avid gamers versed in game design to create a fun science learning game that teaches evolution, adaptation and the history of life on earth to $8^{th}$ and $9^{th}$ graders.Funded by the National Science Foundation, we strove to design a game with high fun value, great science, and great pedagogy that also was good for girls. Ideally the game would integrate learning and fun in new ways.Game design progressed through 50 versions across four quite different game concepts (Earth Zoo Ship, The Critter Card Game, The Tree of Life Game, and Life Preservers), informed by frequent playtesting as well as design team member input. Pedagogy, science, and fun often conflicted. Girls were harder to engage and motivate than boys. Version 50 playtested well and will be used in experimental research on playstyle, gender and learning.
File Format	PDF
ISBN	159593250X
Language	English
Publisher	Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)
Publisher Date	2005-11-03
Publisher Place	New York
Access Restriction	Subscribed
Subject Keyword	Learning User research Pedagogy Content Games User experience Children Gender Playtesting Prototyping User studies Cognitive psychology
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article

Sl.	Authority	Responsibilities	Communication Details
1	Ministry of Education (GoI), Department of Higher Education	Sanctioning Authority	https://www.education.gov.in/ict-initiatives
2	Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	Host Institute of the Project: The host institute of the project is responsible for providing infrastructure support and hosting the project	https://www.iitkgp.ac.in
3	National Digital Library of India Office, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	The administrative and infrastructural headquarters of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in
4	Project PI / Joint PI	Principal Investigator and Joint Principal Investigators of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in Prof. Saswat Chakrabarti will be added soon
5	Website/Portal (Helpdesk)	Queries regarding NDLI and its services	support@ndl.gov.in
6	Contents and Copyright Issues	Queries related to content curation and copyright issues	content@ndl.gov.in
7	National Digital Library of India Club (NDLI Club)	Queries related to NDLI Club formation, support, user awareness program, seminar/symposium, collaboration, social media, promotion, and outreach	clubsupport@ndl.gov.in
8	Digital Preservation Centre (DPC)	Assistance with digitizing and archiving copyright-free printed books	dpc@ndl.gov.in
9	IDR Setup or Support	Queries related to establishment and support of Institutional Digital Repository (IDR) and IDR workshops	idr@ndl.gov.in

Theories meet realities: designing a learning game for girls