Level Up: Launching My Seminar Journey into Gaming in Higher Education

Next week, I’m initiating my gaming seminar in higher education for Georgetown University’s Learning, Design, and Technology program. I’m thrilled, as always, since it’s a fascinating topic and one I’m eager to see my students engage with. I have many plans and concepts, which are roughly 99% finalized. Here, I will share those plans and ideas, in part for feedback, as well as to document some of my teaching practices publicly.

This is a course I’ve taught previously. The objective is to familiarize students with the various ways higher education can utilize gaming, enabling them to make informed choices regarding the topic in their future professional endeavors. For instance, they may become part of educational design teams in academia or other areas.

The structure of the course comprises a variety of activities. Students will play example games and exchange notes, both in person and in writing. They will engage with scholarly readings. I will present briefly on each type of game. Gradually, they will accumulate a final project, either an educational game or a comprehensive plan for a gamified class.

Initially, we introduce tabletop, role-playing, and computer games to provide students with an understanding of the entire field. (I reference sports but won’t delve into them greatly unless students bring it up.) Subsequently, we explore the applications within colleges and universities, focusing on educational aspects. We experience educational computer, tabletop, and role-playing games, while also examining gamification. Then, we concentrate on design features, building on our previous experiences and attempting some complex example games. The final month of the course branches into several topics, including storytelling, AI, and a subject collaboratively determined by students.

I’m incorporating some new elements in the class because I can’t help but experiment. I’ve reduced the readings slightly and allocated more in-class time for game design. One session is particularly centered on design work and accommodates overflow content and student reflection on our journey. I am aiming to provide more time for gameplay because students required it previously. The technological component is somewhat diminished since we didn’t adequately cover each tool last time. Additionally, I’m reorganizing the seminar to accommodate a fully hybrid/HyFlex format, with approximately half of the students online and the other half remote; I’ll be writing a follow-up post about this.

I have also amplified the climate change theme. There are additional climate-related games, and I plan to make this topic more prominent.

Here’s the syllabus. I’ve removed some links as they led to restricted files.

January 14, 2025 – Introductions and into the magic circle

• The concept and practice of the course
• Our individual gaming experiences
• Introduction to gaming (slides)
• An introductory game: The Quiet Year
• Technology: Twine and Steam (please download to your class device)
• Writing in Canvas:
  1. Student self-description character sheets
  2. What is your game persona’s D&D alignment? (This quiz might assist)

January 21, 2025 – Tabletop gaming

January 28, 2025 – Role Playing Games – CLASS ONLINE

• Introduction (slides)
• Readings: Fuist, “The Agentic Imagination – Tabletop Role-playing Games as a Cultural Tool”; Garcia, “Privilege, Power, and D&D”
• Games: we’ll be utilizing Year Zero as a system (please copy this character sheet)
• Design exercise: RPG for a higher education course

February 4, 2025 – Computer Gaming

February 11, 2025 –  Education and Gaming, I

• • Introduction (slides)
  • Reading: James Paul Gee, What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy. (1-69; Appendix)
  • Games:
  • Overview of context for one of next week’s matches

***February 17: Evaluation of one match due; no session this week

February 25, 2025 – Education and Gaming, II – CLASS ONLINE

• • Reading: James Paul Gee, What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy (71-219).
  • Games:
  1. Computer games, science and humanities: Bondbreaker; Waterworks!
  2. Role-playing games: Reacting to the Past
     • • Your gamebook
       • Churches of Norwich
       • The city of Pistoia reacts
       • Avicenna on medieval medicine

(Spring break March 4, 2025)

March 11, 2025 – Gamification

March 19, 2025 – Design for gaming and education, I

***March 21 – Proposal for final project due

March 26, 2025 – Design for gaming and education, II

April 2, 2025 – Narration and games

• Introduction to storytelling
• Readings: Gordon Civic Creativity and Role-Playing Games in Deliberative Process; Alexander, “Gaming: Storytelling on a Small Scale” and “Gaming: Storytelling on a Large Scale”, from The New Digital Storytelling, pp 97-127.
• Games:
• Collaborative game development period

April 9, 2025 – Design, exploration, and catch-up

• Collaborative game development period
• Bring a game for our gameplay
• Reflect on our learning experiences thus far

April 16, 2025 – AI, gaming, and education

• Students collectively decide next week’s themes and tasks
• Readings:
• Exercises:
  1. How to optimally utilize generative AI
  2. Employ AI in creating tabletop, RPG, and computer games

• Collaborative game development period

April 23, 2025 – Student selected theme:  

April 30, 2025 – Final project exhibitions and presentations

• Invite us to engage and obtain feedback

***May 6 – final project submission

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Next in line: reimagining this class for HyFlex.

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