We've only just begun...

Wow! Just finished my first Globaloria game design class and I am nothing short of amazed! I have ten students, all guys, that are really into this class. I must admit that I thought half of them would drop the class when they found out about the wiki work and blogging, expecting perhaps a more intense software based class. But no, they really got into the whole experience and were all enthusiastic and eager to take part. Bottom line - the blogosphere, as of 15 minutes ago, has 10 new bloggers!

About to start - some thoughts about motivation

My Globaloria game design class begins this Friday, Jan 22nd. I must admit I am really looking forward to it, but am at the same time a bit apprehensive, maybe because of the volume of work or maybe the newness of it all. Don't get me wrong, I do feel that I have been well prepared by the Globaloria team through our orientation and training sessions. I really appreciate the help and guidance than my mentor, Patrick provided at this past weekend's academy.

So, why my concern? I think it has to do with motivation of the students and what I can do to ensure that they start, and continue to be, motivated. As a college class the students choose to take this class and are paying for it. Good news is that they must be motivated to have done that. I believe that will arrive interested and excited. The class, at this point, is not required in any program, rather it is an elective they can use in a variety of programs. They will come to the class with little to no experience with a wiki and blogging. My challenge will be to motivate them to look beyond just the basics of game design and to see the use and importance of the social media tools. They will arrive intrinsically motivated. I plan to help them keep that motivation by:

• Involving them in the learning process by stressing the importance of collaboration and teamwork. Letting them know that their input is important to everyone's success.
• Relating the work they will be doing, and how they do it, to the real-world of work they will face after they graduate.
• Stressing that their success, or failure, is in their hands. I am there to help and guide, but they will have to work to succeed.

As time goes on I will update this blog with news of our progress, highlighting success as well as setbacks. Stay tuned. It's going to be a great adventure!

A New Year Begins...

The hectic end of the semester and the Christmas holidays did not leave much time for game development on my part, nor any time for learning more Flash goodies. But now, I am back at it and will be contributing to the Guy and the Dolls game, along with our team. Really looking forward to what Globaloria has to offer in the new year. For now let me leave you with a New Year's wish and image... For those not familiar with the fish eggs in this image, think of them as children of Nemo!


Be sure to click on the image for an enlarged view.

And the journey continues . . .

An old Chinese proverb says that the longest journey begins with but a single step. Our recent Globaloria training weekend seemed to me to be a first step in our journeys along the Globaloria pathway. Based on that introduction it looks like it will certainly be an exciting and educational journey.

Now two weeks later I find myself taking steps two and, maybe, three. I have spent time working on my Flash skills and actually posted (with Angie's kind assistance) two Flash screens for our game. The idea was to create something that made words look like they were 'raining' down on the screen, for the player to choose from. Well, I must confess that I can now have words do just about anything we need them to do, except maybe for singing. I have not been able to work that out yet, maybe for steps four and beyond of the journey.

As resources for Flash learning I am of course using all the great info, demos, etc. on the main Globaloria educator's page. In addition I also use an online resource for software training that has video tutorials for all types of software programs. It is a subscription service that my school subscribes to. If you would like to see it go to lynda.com

A powerful educational moment . . .

For many years I have been a very avid photographer. I have taken thousands of rolls of film and loved every minute of it. But it wasn't until the digital revolution that replaced film that I came to realize how really limited my capabilities were. So for me, one of the most amazing educational moments came when I first turned on my computer just a few years ago and used Photoshop software for the first time. The realization that my photography efforts would be limited literally only by my imagination was a powerful moment. With Photoshop I could 'tinker' to my heart's content and truly learn at my speed and convenience.  

Blogs I like to follow . . .

I have listed two of my favorite blogs to the right. These are both photo oriented so do not have a direct relationship to what we are doing with our Globaloria workshop, but they are excellent examples of full-featured blogs. Both provide links in the text of the post, are very well designed, and integrate video frequently throughout.

First experience with games . . .

Today at the Globaloria workshop I had my first experience with computer games designed for education. Of the games I tried the one that got my attention and interest was Free Rice. This game addresses hunger and allows the player to actually accumulate real rice grains that will be donated. The game is relatively simple but engaging based on the moving graphics of rice added when the correct answer is given and removed when an answer is missed.

Angie's comments about this game were similar, except she did not seem to find anything that she wanted to learn from this game. I would like to know how the motion of the rice grains was achieved. Neither of us commented on the usability of the game.

Globaria blog #1

It begins