Just what is a game jam? It is a short event, usually only a day or two, where game developers plan, design and create a short game. Similar to a music jam session, game jams don’t involve much pre-planning and rely on immediate idea generation and improvisation. Game design companies have these jam sessions regularly, and while many of the games that happen here are digital, some are paper-based. They usually occur in one physical location to allow for immediate, organic collaboration. While there is an element of competition, most of the work is focused on collaboration towards a common goal.

I have witnessed some of these game jams, and have talked with many gaming experts to learn more about it. I wanted to learn more about game jams to help me come up with ideas for how we might include an activity like this in classroom instruction.

The following video will help you visualize how the process works:

I see a lot of great opportunity to teach and assess 21st century skills, focus on deeper learning, and present content. Here are steps and tips to get you started:

1. Create a Flexible Space
If you watch the video above, you will see the room change — literally. The room is set up in a way that allows for presentation, small group work, space for making and more. Make sure you have the space or can create a space that is fluid and can easy be transformed to meet the needs of the teams and the steps in the game jam process.

2. Provide Digital or Physical Tools
As teams create and decide upon their games, they will need materials to do so. However, don’t assume that a game jam is only about creating digital games. While jammers might use a digital tool like Gamestar Mechanic to create their game, they might also use physical materials like paper, glue, magazines and scissors. Have these materials available, and provide voice and choice for students to pick what materials will best meet their needs. At a GameDesk game jam, a team developed a pizza game that was aligned to math content about fractions. This game was created with physical, not digital, materials.

3. Embrace Principles of Games Design
A game jam is a great opportunity to teach fundamentals of game design, from story line and narrative to the actual mechanics. Normally, participants in game jams come to it with a lot of prior knowledge, although many game jam teams have members with very little knowledge of these mechanics. The extent to which you teach this might depend on the level of students or time constraints in the classroom. However, since the game jam is in essence a design challenge, you can align to principles of STEM or STEAM education. Make sure to give students designated time before the game jam to learn these principles.

4. Domain Analysis
This is probably one of the most interesting steps of the game jam. Here, the teams investigate specific content areas (or domains) and uncover how the content is both taught and represented. For example, teams can find specific learning targets in their game content, and also note how those targets are represented visually or digitally. They research how the content is traditionally taught and also assessed. Teams craft specific learning targets from this exploration and research to ensure that, when they get to the idea phase, they can create a focused game targeting very specific learning objectives.

5. Team Building
Game jams always start with team builders. In a real game jam, the team members have often never worked together before; therefore, it’s crucial to set a tone for collaboration and problem solving. It’s the same for our students. In order to set them up for success, icebreakers and other team builders need to occur.

6. Ideation
After bonding as a team and analyzing content domains, the ideation phase begins. This is where teams brainstorm and collaborate on ideas for the game itself. Relying on its collective knowledge of game design and content, the team starts to craft ideas for a game that will target a specific learning objective. These objectives are tight, and there are often not too many of them. They are created in the Domain Analysis component (step 4 above), but here the team gets to start narrowing and picking these targets as well as decide on the mechanics.

7. Deadlines and Benchmarks
The game jam itself has a very specific deadline, usually a full day (eight hours) of work, including the presentations and pitches. However within the game jam day, there are further benchmarks. For example, at some point during the day, teams are no longer allowed to generate game ideas and are forced to work or “make.” This helps create the urgency for the deadline and also helps to move along the process. Consider setting specific time limits for some of the steps in the game jam.

8. Presentation, Playing and Judging
The culminating event for the game jam is presenting the game product and having all participants play the game. Not only is this an important assessment, but it is also an important way to celebrate the jammers’ hard work. Judges need to have specific criteria for evaluating the games. These criteria might be different for every game jam. They might include relevance to content or curriculum, marketability, player interest, ability to collaborate, and more.

As you consider a game jam for your classroom, you might focus the assessment on the content area, or simply on 21st century skills like creativity and collaboration. I know many of us have more freedom after “testing season,” so that also might be a great time to give this idea a shot. Just make sure you’re clear on the learning objectives and project outcomes that you expect from your students. Don’t forget to watch the game jammers in action in the time-lapse video above to give you a full picture of what it would look like!

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As I travel and work with teachers to improve practice and increase student achievement, classroom management is often a topic we focus on in professional development. Whether managing a 1:1 classroom or understanding how a teacher manages a PBL project, teachers are always looking for best practices in how to make sure the classroom is managed effectively.

This topic is also coupled with the idea of engagement. We know that if we are engaging our students, then management issues are alleviated or disappear all together. Whenever I work with teachers I also make this statement:

“What is the best tool for management? Engaging curriculum and instruction!”

However, I’ve come to understand that the term “engagement” needs to be unpacked before addressing issues of management in the classroom. If you ask an educator, “What does engagement look like?” responses will surely vary. I remember when I first started teaching, and preparing for a classroom visit by my principal or supervising administrator. I always wanted to make sure the room was quiet in general, there were no outbursts and that students were silently working on their assignments at their tables. Now I realize these are not quality indicators of engagement. They are quality indicators of compliance, which is different.

Daniel Pink makes an significant quite in his video (and book) Drive, although his context is focus on the workplace. “Management is good if you want compliance, but if you want engagement, self-directed is better.” Here Pink reframes the whole conversation on what it means to be productive, contribute to a goal and do work.

I don’t want just compliance for my students. I want engagement. Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose are three ideas (borrowed from Pink) that can move our classrooms to focus on engagement, rather than on compliance. When we do, classroom management becomes a conversation about strategies to support learners, rather than a way to make them “follow the rules” in a one-size-fits-all model. Let’s reframe the conversation on classroom management, and instead focus on engagement first!

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“A game is an opportunity to focus our energy, with relentless optimism, at something we’re good at (or getting better at) and enjoy. In other words, gameplay is the direct emotional opposite of depression.”
Jane McGonigal, Reality is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World

Game-based learning is fast becoming a trend in education. Teachers across the globe are experimenting with not only using games, but also game mechanics in the classroom. Games engage us. Our students are playing games whether we approve or not. Whether spending hours at home in the evening playing Call of Duty or more casually playing Angry Birds, students are spending time relentless trying to achieve. We can use games in the classroom to not only leverage engagement but also to align games to instructional principles.

Games as Assessment: As students play games they are being assessed on their progress, provided feedback, and allowed to try again without fear of failure. Our education system does not always align to that principle. Often we punish children with “points” as they practice with the content. Games do not do this. Players are given the freedom to fail and given specific feedback through formative assessment on how to improve. In fact, when players win the level or game (the summative assessment), they are rewarded with a true sense of accomplishment as the assessment is meaningful. Games are excellent models for assessment best practices.

Games as Engagement: Games are carefully and intentionally designed environments that create flow—the balance between challenge and progress. Great games are challenging but not too difficult and thus not boring. On the contrary, they have specific mechanics to create this game flow. It’s not necessary about winning—in games like Tetris you are destined to lose—but rather a game gives us multiple victories on rigorous challenges. The rigor engages us, and a game scaffolds that rigor intentionally and in an exemplary manner.

Authentic Learning Experiences: James Paul Gee, game-based learning advocate and guru refers to this as “situated learning.” We know that students must construct and apply knowledge for deeper learning. In great games, students are both learning content and applying in complex problems to solve. Take Portal for example. In this game, the player must create portals between two flat planes. The player not only experiences principles of physics, but must use this knowledge to solve related puzzles. In addition, the player takes on an authentic role. Although based in a fantasy world, the player becomes one with the playable character of the game and invests in the growth and story of that character. When playing in this authentic story and learning environment,the player sees the relevance in learning the content for the purposes of playing.

Games can be another tool for engaging in rigorous and authentic learning. There are many games available to classrooms, from educational games at iCivics, to educational versions of games, like Minecraft. There are even noneducational games that are being paired with instruction to make the game educational, such as Sid Meier’s Civilization or World of Warcraft. Explore what other teachers have done and start engaging students in meaningful play.

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