EDUCATION FOR PLAY

Digital Games for Education: When Meanings Play

This paper documents the development of an educationally focused web-based game, Contagion, detailing how such a practical development project has led us to re-theorize questions about what is “educational,” and how and in what ways that relates to the ludic. With reference to and within the framework of design-based research, we detail here the challenges we encountered designing this “alterna...

Online role-play environments for higher education

As online environments and tools have evolved over the last 15–20 years, their use for role-based learning has expanded. This analysis draws on work for an Australian project that has been sharing and developing knowledge about the use of online role-plays in higher education. We describe the learning needs that online role-play can meet, and give examples of solutions—some using custom-built s...

Education for science and science for education: more than a play upon words.

In the celebration of the Oswaldo Cruz Institute centenary, we wanted to stress our concern with the relationship between two of its missions: research and education. What are the educational bases required for science and technology activities on health sciences for the future years? How can scientists collaborate to promote the popularization of academic knowledge and to improve a basic educa...

Play Education Video Games on Their Terms

It is imperative when utilizing educational video games in K-12 classrooms that student preferences with regard to game play, purpose, and design be considered in order to maximize game play efficiency for learning. As Web 2.0 content infiltrates our educational medium, student customization is key. This manuscript intends to share customization requests gleaned during an 18-week experimental s...

Perceptions of Play: Using Play-Doh to Enhance the Student Experience in Bioscience Higher Education