Case Study sessions on serious games & immersive learning projects

This case study will demonstrate teaching and training strategies that leverage mobile augmented reality (AR) games and simulations in K-12, high education and military learning environments. While AR has the potential to provide participatory, situated, and collaborative experiences that foster inquiry-based problem solving and critical thinking skills, it also presents other unique opportunities and challenges to teachers and trainers. Grounded in data from an ongoing National Science Foundation grant, these unique opportunities and challenges will be explored in the context of K-12 classroom and military counter-insurgency training.

The case study will explore results demonstrating that not only did teachers and students describe high engagement, but they also reported the positive benefits of collaborative problem solving as an integral part of their success, both in the game and as learning outcomes.

Presenter:

Dr. Matt Dunleavy
Assistant Professor, Instructional Technology at Radford University

Dr. Matt Dunleavy is an Assistant Professor in Instructional Technology at Radford University in Virginia. From 2006 to 2007, he was a postdoctoral fellow in learning technologies at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and the director of the Handheld Augmented Reality Project (HARP). Dr. Dunleavy received his Ph.D. in Educational Research, Statistics, and Evaluation at the University of Virginia, where he focused on the impact of ubiquitous computing on student learning and the classroom environment.

Every individual’s personal reaction to change can have an impact on the success of an organization’s initiatives. The chances of success can be bolstered by strengthening employees’ agility and capacity for change. To address this issue, Tandem Learning teamed up with change management expert Linda Hoopes to create The Change Game. The game content is based on the concept of personal resilience and the seven characteristics that individuals rely upon to adapt to change. It offers a fun and engaging way of helping individuals assess their own abilities to adapt to change and identify ways to strengthen their personal resilience. Initially designed for an automotive company, the game has evolved into an off-the-shelf product that can help employees at any level of any organization adapt in an ever-changing environment.

This case study session will incorporate group discussion and Q&A, specifically around the topics most relevant to the case study, including game design, addressing learning objectives in the affective domain, behavior identification, self-assessment, on-the-job transfer, and personal development planning.

Presenter:

Koreen Olbrish
CEO, Tandem Learning

RehabCare was transitioning to new application software and a new point-of-service device, the Apple iPod Touch. They needed to train their therapists and Program Directors on new practice software and the new point of service device simultaneously. Successfully implementing a combined PC and mobile platform, unfamiliar technology with the new point-of-service devices, and new critical software across 1,260 geographic locations for 15,000 employees seemed like an impossible goal, not to mention a time-consuming task. Historically, RehabCare had taken an approach of face-to-face training with Program Directors (PDs), preparing the PDs to transfer on new knowledge and instruction to the therapists – a time consuming approach that was unequipped to tackle the challenges RehabCare faced this time around.

In determining the best way to organize and present a solution for delivery on the IpodTouch, it was decided to maximize the context of the Therapists daily work (not just the how they do what they do but also the flow of their day as well as the supporting paper-based tools they use within their job.) In identifying all of the tasks the therapists needed to be trained within the SMART Mobile application, the solution was divided into 8 course content areas that coincide with their daily activities, including “Learn by Doing” mobile simulations. Over 15,000 users were effectively trained within a 9 month window. Learning is now seen as a critical component to success within RehabCare Group.

This case study session will highlight both the instructional and engagement design strategies as well as development platform decisions and challenges faced during rollout of this type of learning.

This learning solution recently won an ”Innovation to eLearning” merit award from CLO Magazine in September 2010.

Presenter:

Brenda Enders is a learning professional with over 16 years’ experience as an instructor, curriculum developer and instructional designer. She is currently the e-Learning Practice Leader for SSE where she oversees the design and deployment of innovative custom learning solutions for Fortune 1000 clients and the U.S. Government. She has guided SSE to numerous awards for design excellence including 2 Brandon Hall awards.

Brenda is a member of the CLO Business Intelligence Board, local president of ISPI St. Louis Chapter, member of ASTD and the eLearning Guild, an author, a freelance writer and alumna of St. Louis University.

This case study will showcase the wide range of use for Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) as learning tools. An array of successful ARGs will be explored, including large conference-sized ARGs for networking and content learning, as well as small, replayable ARGs for group engagement and learning. In each case, the ARGs have been used to teach specific learning goals, and meet specific programming goals. On a large scale, case studies will be presented on a sales training ARG for Constellation Wine and a conference ARG, Dr. Strangelearn, that helped players collect information to overcome organizational obstacles to new learning technologies. On a smaller scale, a Mystery Animal ARG project is being implemented at the Elmwood Park Zoo in Norristown, PA.

Impacts from ARG projects, including data from players and stakeholders, along with increases in user engagement will be also be discussed in this case study session.

Presenter:

Koreen Olbrish
CEO, Tandem Learning

MPHNP: A Case Study into Designing Experiential Games to Meet Instructional Objectives

The Military Police Host Nation Policing (MPHNP) Simulation has been developed for the United States Army Military Police School (USAMPS) to train Junior Officers and Non-Commissioned Officers (NCOs) to prepare for Security, Stability, Transition and Reconstruction Operations (SSTRO). CTC designed and developed the MPHNP simulation to place the learner into the role of a Squad Leader investigating a fictional Middle Eastern host nation police station with a squad and interpreter. The learner is presented with a challenging and dynamic scenario in which the squad must explore the station grounds, inspect station objects and engage with station inhabitants in order to make key decisions regarding security needs while maintaining rapport with the host nation police force. This case study will take a look at designing experiential games to meet instructional objectives.

Presenters:

Ms. Amy Morrison
Director, Software Development, Concurrent Technologies

Mr. Ron Punako
Senior Software Engineer, Concurrent Technologies

Ms. Joy Pachucki
Instructional Designer, Concurrent Technologies

The New York City Office of Emergency Management successfully ran live hurricane exercises at facilities designated as emergency shelters both in 2006 and 2008. However, the logistical and cost requirements of training 2,000 managers this way did not make it a feasible option moving forward.

The solution, a 4-8 hour-long hurricane shelter learning simulation takes place in a virtual hurricane shelter developed in Second Life that is modeled on a real school building in Brooklyn. The learner is playing the role of a Hurricane Shelter Manager—opening, running, and closing the shelter. This 3-D virtual rehearsal and training simulation helps City employees practice their shelter management skills and apply problem-solving skills in a realistic environment.

The project was developed by the City University of New York School of Professional Studies for the NYC Office of Emergency Management (OEM). Gronstedt Group was the virtual worlds development partner and Daden developed the authoring system.

Attend this case study session to experience the unique virtual worlds simulation that will inspire new learning solutions. Feedback from test groups, City employees and American Red Cross workers will also be discussed during the session.

Presenter:

Andrew Boyarsky
Project Director, School of Professional Studies, CUNY Graduate Center

Original Impressions, in collaboration with St. Thomas University (STU), developed the “Take the Campus Tour,” an online, interactive game that engages South Florida high school students in a unique virtual road where they learn about academic degrees, alumni success stories, hot career trends and STU campus life. The strategy integrates both members of the media and the public sector with students’ increased use of technology.

The STU mascot – the Bobcat – welcomes visitors leading them to informational videos, photo galleries and valuable information on career preparation, science and math funding, program specializations and access to financial aid. As students mouse across different campus buildings, they can read details about the various points of interest within STU campus life, email professors, sign up to receive additional information, or submit pictures taken at a high school visit. Each of these activities rewards them with points, or student “credits,” earned. A sophisticated software, developed exclusively for STU by Original Impressions, enables students to save their place, take notes, exchange news with friends and get further involved in the social aspect of the site. To further extend the “life” of the site, the students are encouraged to share photos on Facebook, which helps accumulate additional points.

Presenter:

Sean Karshis
Chief Technology Officer
Original Impressions

Sean Karshis is Chief Technology Officer for Original Impressions, LLC. In this capacity, he is responsible for the overall tactical and strategic direction and deployment of information technology applications, business practices and solutions, software procurement and purchasing, and all other aspects of IT functions.

With more than 14 years of experience in software and Web production, Karshis has helped evolve Original Impressions into a full service, multi-media communications provider, capable of delivering a full complement of comprehensive Web development services. Karshis and his team have built a proprietary, robust Commerce Enabled Management Information (CEMI) system that assists companies such as Burger King Corporation and Subway manage on-line image catalogues, e-commerce activity and inventory administration. Additionally, Karshis is responsible for overseeing the company’s system and business application fault tolerance, backups, business continuity and disaster recovery planning and preparation, as well as researching new and emerging technologies, trends and advancements within the industry.

In its original form, Enspire Learning’s Executive Challenge simulation presents opportunities for learners to build valuable leadership communications and teamwork skills and focus on long-term solutions in a changing environment – all desirable outcomes for Defense Acquisition University’s management teams. But it was clear that a business simulation would not be optimal for DAU’s audience of government employees. Enspire’s challenge was to customize this experience to meet the particular needs of DAU’s target audience. Ultimately, Enspire developed a product based on the Executive Challenge engine that is unique to DAU’s organizational hierarchy and structures. The Intact Teams Simulation, as this customization is known, allows teams to exercise knowledge and prudent judgment to structure a viable program solution, based on the phases of DAU’s systems acquisitions process. The result is a learning experience that retains the strong strategic and collaborative elements of Executive Challenge in the specific organizational context of DAU, with lessons to bear for other organizations looking to design or customize existing simulations.

Join this session to compare and contrast Executive Challenge and the Intact Teams Simulation. As Enspire walks participants through the two simulations, participants will not only come to understand the mechanics of each but also how we applied design and development decisions to make the Intact Teams Simulation a unique, targeted solution for DAU’s non-business audience. Participants will also discuss how simulations can be designed to be versatile and customizable to the varying needs of diverse audiences and when simulations should be designed with future customizations in mind.

Presenter:

Robert Bell
Enspire
Senior Instructional Designer

Robert is a Senior Instructional Designer at Enspire Learning with over 8 years of experience in education and instructional design. He completed his undergraduate work in English at the University of Texas in Austin before going to work as a teacher in an under-resourced school in the Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. While teaching in New York, he received an M.S. in Education from Brooklyn College. Robert then freelanced as a writer and instructional designer for a variety of e-learning companies and educational publishers before settling at Enspire in 2008. In his time at Enspire, Robert has worked on projects with a diverse group of companies and other organizations, including Dell, Cisco, Junior Achievement, Harvard Business Publishing, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and City University of New York.

FAS began its bold experiment to PROVE that video game could teach and train in 2004. The newly formed FAS-Learning Technologies Program applied for and received three peer-reviewed, federally-funded grants to design and develop learning games. With a competitive grant from the National Science Foundation (Award number 0427827), FAS lead a collaboration with Immunologists at Brown University, with graphic art experts at University of Southern California. A biology game was selected, because of the need to engage more students in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) related fields. Immunology was chosen because high school teachers indicate that this subject is one of the most difficult to present.

Immune Attack is a 3rd person shooter video game, designed for high school students, that teaches molecular biology that is usually reserved for college level biology major courses. But high school kids dive in and play intensely, despite the strange topic. Key parts of the game mechanism are that every object in the game functions as it should in nature, except for the fictional, cell sized submarine (called a nanobot) that the player pilots remotely through the body. In this manner, game actions that are not true to nature are clear, because they involve the nanobot. Additionally, great care was taken to generate the communication that comes from the game’s “on board advisors” so that it helps the player play the game while always presenting information that is true to science.

Attendees in the session will get hands-on experience with the game and gain an understanding of the effect a video game can have on students’ systematic understanding.

Presenter:

Melanie Stegman, Ph.D.
Federation of American Scientists
Director, Learning Technologies Program

Melanie Stegman, Ph.D. is the Director of the Learning Technologies Program. Stegman is also the Project Director of Immune Attack, 2.0, which is funded by a competeitve grant from the NIAID, to support the evaluation and development of Immune Attack 2.0. Building on the ground breaking work of the Learning Technologies Program since 2001, Stegman is taking the development of the Learning Game to new levels. Immune Attack 2.0 will take advantage of the video game characteristics of immersion and interactivity to make the game into the most realistic schematic of biochemical interactions created so far.

Healthseeker is the world’s first serious health-based game of its kind. Developed by Ayogo in collaboration with the Diabetes Hands Foundation and the Joslin Diabetes Centre (Harvard Medical School) and funded by Boeringher Ingleheim Pharmaceuticals Inc. Heathseeker is designed to motivate better lifestyle choices by people living with diabetes, so that they improve both their nutritional and physical health. The game is garnering North America-wide media and health-industry attention for its unique approach to one of the most important problems facing our society today.

By using a game design approach that will be familiar to players of popular casual social games, Healthseeker uses achievements, virtual prizes, and gifting to create instant rewards for healthy behaviour, bridging the gap between intentions and action. As action steps are completed in real-life and players return to report their progress, they receive experience points and other instant awards for their achievements. Badges and experience points accumulate over time and help the player advance to different levels. Special virtual “pats-on-the-back” called Kudos can also be collected, but can only be given away to other players as a show of support. Players can also record their progress and thoughts about their day on their Fridge Door, a wall that displays supportive and inspirational messages from anyone playing the game. The game utilizes the player’s own social graph and uses their friends as sources of inspiration and support as they push beyond intention to live their actions.

Participants will have a chance to use Ayogo’s game, be part of a learning game while they learn and hear examples of how a game can be created around their education goals. Participants can be walked through one of the key interaction loops on HealthSeeker as a demonstration and discuss why the game is designed the way it is. Statistical results achieved in the game will also be explored. Participants will be invited to volunteer their industry/organization and their education/training goals. Ayogo and the group will then outline a serious social media game design, and specific interaction loops built around their particular goals. Participation will be encouraged with small rewards as a form of gamification during the case study.

Presenter:

Michael Fergusson
CEO
Ayogo Games Inc.

Michael is the Chief Executive Officer and founder of Ayogo Games Inc., and is dedicated to the idea that playing is one of the most productive things we can do. He’s been an entrepreneur and innovator on the Web for over 15 years, and the games he has developed have been played by millions on computers and Smartphones all over the world. This year, Ayogo was named the hottest digital media company in Canada, and Michael has been invited to speak on game design at SXSW, Vancouver’s F5 Expo, Games and Health – Vid Week, Banff Television Festival and NextMedia in Toronto, has been featured by Fast Company, MIT Technology Review, CBC, and the Globe and Mail, and was named one of the 10 entrepreneurs to watch in Vancouver’s high-tech community. Michael lives in Vancouver with his beautiful wife and four amazing children.

NC BioNetwork, part of the North Carolina Community College System, has developed gaming and simulation-based virtual learning objects that are designed to support and enhance, but not replace hands-on training opportunities for students and incumbent workers. This case study will provide an overview of instructional design process, education philosophy, methods of instruction and distribution, the importance of team selection, and project management approaches.

As part of this presentation, participants will be given the opportunity to freely use all the virtual learning objects presented. After game play, the audience will be segmented into various groups where guided questions will be posed. In addition, NC BioNetwork will solicit participation from audience members to recommend future development projects.

Presenter:

Vernon Shoaf
Manager
NC BioNetwork

The innovative Great History Conundrum project uses paradigms from online social networks and immersive online alternative reality games to create a four-week long activity based in problem solving, collaboration and competitive play. Through a number of puzzles of varying difficulty, high level searching, filtering and criticism skills were taught. Collaboration and reflection were encouraged through the use of discussion forums and the construction of a collective wiki (a resource the students will be able to use throughout the rest of their degree), and carefully constructed assessment criteria encouraged and assessed engagement with the activity and concepts. The activity additionally served to develop a community of practice early in the undergraduate course, hence improving engagement and performance in the wider academic context.

Student engagement with research skills has increased dramatically (shown through dramatic assessment score improvement and feedback). For example: before the project, 35% of students failed to pass the module, and the average grade was around 50%; in the first and second years of the project pass rates rose to 97% and 100% respectively, and average grades were raised to above 65%.

Attend this session to engage in a short game-based activity to introduce participants to the concepts and provide participants with a practical understanding of the key components of the course. There will also be both online and physical items for participants to browse and explore.

Presenter:

Alex Moseley
University of Leicester
Educational Designer, Course Design & Development Unit

Alex is an Educational Designer at the University of Leicester, where he has had long experience as both practitioner and researcher of course design and development for higher education. He has particular interests in online and distance education, student engagement, and provision of effective research skills and student induction. He also researches online immersive games, and has suggested key features which can be transferred to higher education to ensure high engagement and community development; he was also part of the team behind the first charity ARG, Operation: Sleeper Cell. He was recently awarded the title of University Teaching Fellow.