In this article we have described the Space Treasure game concept as a part of the Playful Learning Environment. The goal of our study was to find ways to increase physical activity in the form of games in the school context. The study demonstrates that the outdoor PLE can be used successfully for that purpose. The study shows that outdoor game as a part of the PLE can be well applied to curriculum-based education employing the phases of orientation, playing, and elaboration (Hyvönen et al., 2006; Kangas et al., 2006; Hyvönen, accepted). The major outcomes and implications of the testing are illustrated in figure 1.
(1) Playability is assessed from the viewpoints of Callois’ (2001) definitions agon, alea, mimicry, and ilnix and the correlations found through testing. The play strategies, which were usually made collaboratively, correlate with agon.
The children’s aim was not primarily to win the game, but to carry on the play as long as possible; this manifests the features of mature play (Bodrova & Leong, 2003). Although the idea was to win the game by finding the treasure and by bringing it to a home planet, the process itself seemed to be more important: to play collaboratively and to prolong the excitement provided by playing. Hence, excitement refers to alea. In addition, the game was not based on mathematical operations only; it was based on chance as well. Thus, the game treats fairly players of different developmental levels.
The context of the game related to mimicry. It was a simulation of the space environment created through children’s imagination. However, mimicry and fantasy could have been supported more. One option is to use appropriate technological solutions that provide a suitable atmosphere for imaginary game worlds and enhance the audiovisual properties of playing processes. One interesting option is to use StoryMat-type technology that “listens” to children (Cassell & Ryokai, 2001). During the game, children would make imaginary sounds relating to space and the Solar System, and tell brief narratives about the ongoing space adventure. In doing so the meaning of the moves from one step to another would be connected to the plot of the story.
During the tests the children used and practiced their balancing and motor skills that recount to ilnix. Body control and motor development relates closely to the common concern that there are not enough physical activities available to children during school days and leisure time. There is a great deal of games available, but only few of them are designed for outdoor use and provide physical activity. Alongside with the PLE and Space Treasure, the Camelot outdoor game (Verhaegh, et al., 2006) and Playware – intelligent and tangible play environment (Lund & Carsten, 2005) are examples of games that encourage children to physical activity.
(2) Enjoyability is examined in the light of Csikszentmihalyi’s (1990) flow experience. Although the flow experience was not measured in detail and not necessarily even present in the testing, it was apparent that the children felt some
Figure 1. The outcomes and implications
sort of enjoyment. The learning of new skills, goal-orientation, continuity, feedback, rules, and a possibility to create strategies provided satisfaction and made the playing challenging enough. Hence, in spite of the easy numbering on the steps, the children found it challenging to create game strategies and to move around by dividing, for instance. The game caused enjoyment that is also typically related to playfulness: It generated clear goals, close attention, loss of self-consciousness, intrinsic motivation, and the belief that an experience is worthwhile for its own sake (Csikszentmihalyi, 1994; 2006). It is also noteworthy that bad playability could be seen decreasing the likelihood of the flow experience because the player has to sacrifice attention and other cognitive resources to the inappropriate activity (Kiili & Lainema, 2006). From this viewpoint, the Space Treasure game tests were promising because the children adopted the game quickly and focused on the calculations and hunting the space treasure.
(3) Usability was considered from two angles: we studied the usability of the wave platform and the game, and the usability of the technology. Learnability had also two dimensions: how the system is adopted and how it promotes learning. The Space Treasure game implemented on the wave platform was promising. The platform and the game could be used and played rather intuitively. The tasks, the content, and the context matched pretty well. The technology was merely a simulation of one potential technology. The simulation, however, succeeded sufficiently for test purposes.
Enhancing the Space Treasure game with digital technology, along the lines of Camelot technology (Verhaegh et al., 2006), could yield opportunities to provide feedback and to make some of the game activities more challenging. On the grounds of this study, technology is an actual affordance for supporting learning, and quality of play. However, we need to be cautious when speaking of the affordances of new technologies and assuming that technology will automatically afford particular learning outcomes (John & Sutherland, 2005). Education is always a unique combination of technological, social, and educational contexts and affordances (Kirschner, et al. 2004).
(4) Playing and informal learning situations provided positive experiences for the children. They tutored each other and felt that they benefited from playing in the physical and cognitive areas. Test playing seemed to promote the children’s social skills as they collaboratively negotiated the plot and the rules. Moreover, it promoted their metacognitive skills as well. The game experiences were consistent with the socio-cultural view of learning (e.g. Vygotsky, 1978; Wells &
Claxton, 2002; Säljö, 2005): learning is a phenomenon whereby people share their experiences of their environment through various forms of communication. In all cases interaction between the players seemed to encourage collaboration and enhance the children’s level of engagement (cf. Price, et al. 2003). Thus, peer interaction and collaborative activity proved to be salient in play (cf. Parr & Townsend, 2002) although the Space Treasure game had been designed to be a game in which only one player wins.
8 Discussion
Novel play and learning environments and computer-based game technologies seek to offer physically challenging and immersive play experiences (Höysniemi et al., 2005) and to create powerful and engaging learning experiences (Facerw et al., 2004). The findings of this study are interesting and provide opportunities to extend this field of research. The purpose of the PLE is to offer children more play, physical activities, and novel learning experiences in curriculum-based learning settings. The Space Treasure game can enhance learning both in formal and in informal contexts. This, however, requires proficient technological solutions modified for the wave platform and user-friendly applications with which educators and children can create games for their own purposes. In the Space Treasure game, the values on the steps should be chosen, mixed, and even combined with other numbers according to user preference. Using the classroom computer, it should also be possible to organize different adaptations of the game, to follow the playing and counting, and to evaluate the processes of play together with the children. This requires technical solutions that make the processes visible. Game creation via classroom computers is already possible in other applications of the PLE game technology, and this provides us more opportunities to study playful learning processes (PLPs) and playful learning, and to build theories on it. It is evident that the use of innovative technologies should complement children’s natural play, which makes the PLE and similar innovations (e.g. Playware and Camelot) well-grounded solutions for learning by playing.
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Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the Let’s Play project (2003–2006), PlayIT project (2006), the Doctoral Programme for Multidisciplinary Research on Learning Environments (2006–2007), and the InnoPlay project (2007–2008) that continues studies related to the PLE. InnoPlay is funded by the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation, municipalities and companies.
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Cooperation with the Smartus team [http://www.smartus.fi]
[http://geocitites.com/smartusteam/]
Learning by teaching is a widely studied method and it seems to be the ideal starting point for an educational game. Despite this, there is only few learning by teaching –based games. The aim of this study is to find out the strengths of the learning by teaching -types of games. This study is a design experiment with a pre- and post test. The pupils participated in this study (n=24) were 6 years old pre-school pupils. During the game play there were researchers and kindergarten teachers present to help the pupils if needed. Game play lasted approximately two hours. Pupils were observed by logging all human computer interactions with computer and by traditional observation. The main result is that a great number of pupils gained from learning by teaching –type of game, but there are also threats: In certain circumstances a pupils might get confused that decreases learning outcome.