Gaming SMALLab: Augmented Learning for Middle School Kids

Kan-Yang Li · Mike Edwards · Claudio Midolo

Wed., June 09, 2:00–3:00, Old Madison

Gaming SMALLab explores embodied play as a strategy for K-12 learning. The project is being spearheaded by David Birchfield (Arizona State University, Arts, Media and Engineering program) and Katie Salen (Parsons the New School for Design, Design and Technology program). The research team at New York, composed of faculty, game designers, curriculum specialists, and wellness experts from Parsons, Quest to Learn, and the Institute of Play, are developing game-based learning scenarios in the areas of math, science, and wellness with a focus on both software design and hardware engineering.

We would like to share our research on bringing in augmented instruments into SMALLab with the intention to shorten the jump from reality into digital game-based learning. By doing so, students spend less time warming up with the hardware and are able to get into the game sooner where learning happens. The idea came from a casual discussion with game design teachers on how to help Foundation students smooth the transition between paper prototype and digital game design. Combining this problem with the idea of players as designers, we thought it would be fun if students could digitize their paper prototypes and turn them into a meaningful digital game level.

We brought this idea into SMALLab by creating a simple image-recognition system (Computer Vision Box) that reads a paper-based game level created by students using a paper template and colored stickers. Each colored sticker represented a different game component in the corresponding SMALLab game scenario. The learning scenario was focused on helping students understand core system-thinking concepts like how elements in a dynamic system relate to other elements within a system. Students worked to create game levels by placing the stickers on the template to indicate where in the level they wanted a particular game event to take place. When the level template was “read” via the computer vision box, students would immediately see their paper prototypes transformed into a digital game in SMALLab, which they could play and easily modify. During class, students would go back and forth between two media, digital and analogue, to work out their best levels based on what they set out to do.

Designing games for SMALLab is similar to designing games for the Nintendo Wii, but with more freedom because SMALLab doesn’t require a set of pre-designed controllers. It is a flexible game system that opens up to all kinds of possibilities. As part of the project we’ve create an inventory of augmented game controllers for various kinds of SMALLab scenarios, including a Paddle controller and Pump controller for a systems-thinking scenario called LifeRaft, a Metal Detector controller for a physics focused Light-and-Mirror scenario, and a low-cost controller kit that lets kids build their own controllers for any SMALLab scenario.