User:Acrider/reacting games
Reacting games are educational role-playing games set in the past, with a focus on student debates about great texts.
Attributes[edit]
Reacting games have the following attributes:
- Real historical setting
- Rich texts
- Multiple class meetings
- Roles with well-developed characters
- Victory objectives
- Indeterminacy
- Reading, writing, and speaking
- Narrative structure with drama
- Possibility of alternate historical outcomes
- Accessibility to non-specialists
Reacting games might also include the following common elements:
- Factions
- Elements of secrecy
- Opening vignettes
- Central texts
A growing number of reacting games also make use of Personal Interest Points (PIPs).
History[edit]
Reacting games developed as a genre of educational games in late 1990s.[1] The prototype for these games is the Reacting to the Past series published by Pearson-Longman. This pedagogy was originally developed for use in freshmen seminar class quickly expanded into history, art history, and science[2]
Relationship to Other Games and Simulations[edit]
Case Studies[edit]
Case studies have have long been used in the medical, business, and legal education. They might involve discussion, debate, problem-based learning, or role-play.[3] By contrast, reacting games require debate and role-play. Unlike case studies, reacting games also must be set in a true historical setting.
Live action role-playing[edit]
A live action role-playing games (LARP) has participants assuming roles and playing them out in costume. While reacting games do indeed have students playing historical roles, this rarely involves costumes. Reacting games are used for education while LARP is primarily used for recreation.
Educational Debating[edit]
In educuational debate (or debate team), students competitively debate a topic following explicit rules. While educational debate involves only two teams ("for" and "against"), reacting games can involve multiple teams, including an undecided, indeterminate set of players. Educational debate also involves no role-playing and is not set in a historical setting.
Assessment[edit]
Psychological studies of students participating in reacting games have shown students to gain an "elevated self-esteem and empathy, a more external locus of control, and greater endorsement of the belief that human characteristics are malleable compared with controls."[4] Additional assessments are being conducted to gauge science content learning in some reacting games.[5]
Notes and References[edit]
- Notes
- References
- ^ Setting Student's Minds on Fire, M.C. Carnes, The Chronicle of Higher Education, March 6, 2011., http://chronicle.com/article/Setting-Students-Minds-on/126592, Retrieved June 21, 2012.
- ^ Debating Pluto:Searching for the Classroom of the Future and Ending up in the Past, A. Crider, Astronomy Beat, 72, 1.
- ^ Case Types & Teaching Methods: A Classification Scheme, National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science. http://sciencecases.lib.buffalo.edu/cs/collection/method.asp Retrieved June 21, 2012.
- ^ All the world’s a stage? Consequences of a role-playing pedagogy on psychological factors and writing and rhetorical skill in college undergraduates. Stroessner, Steven J.; Beckerman, Laurie Susser; Whittaker, Alexis. Journal of Educational Psychology, Vol 101(3), Aug 2009, 605-620.
- ^ Collaborative Research: Reacting to the Past Pedagogy for Science Education (2009). National Science Foundation, Award 0920441, http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0920441 Retrieved June 21, 2012.