Designing Video Games that Encourage Players to Integrate Formal Representations with Informal Play

In this paper we present a case study of a player of the game FormulaT Racing—a prototype racing video game we created to explore design principles that could transform popular games into powerful learning environments—shifting between and ultimately integrating video game and school-based epistemological framings. We show a player shifting from describing acceleration and velocity in a purely game-based narrative during a pre-game interview to descriptions that seamlessly integrated both game and formal representations in a post-game interview. We contend that this change is due to novel interactions with key representations introduced throughout the game and discuss design implications for future games.