Brock Dubbels's Page

Learning does not need to be sacrifice and suffering. Interestingly, when working with learners, many do not consider learning in a play environment as learning like they expect in school; when asked, they felt like they should have had to study and be tested.

Conversely, when the learners were asked to discuss the game and play activities, and these were related to traditional academic outcomes, and the processes they participated in were made explicit, they felt they had achieved a much greater awareness of their learning, the content, and felt more confidence in their ability to build knowledge.

A game can teach facts, process, and context, but it is also important to have the game and play extend beyond the play space into the workspace, and create an integration of making work playful, and working hard at that play. This must engage the learner emotionally and cognitively.

My games, which I consider a structured form of play, go beyond traditional views of the magic circle, because in today's world, game play for entertainment does too, with fanfiction, transmedial narratives, social networking, and affinity groups.

These activities can all be integrated as an extension of the game, extending the opportunity to learn content, and extend the context of the game into other aspects of the learner’s life, providing performance data and allowing for self-improvement with feedback, and data collection that is assessed, measured and evaluated for policy.

When I design a learning environment, I do so with research in mind, so that I can look at what I created, what the learners experienced, and build theory. What is unique about what I do is the systems approach and the way I reverse engineer play as a deep and effective learning tool into transformative learning, where pleasurable activities can be counted as learning.

Educational research in cognitive psychology, curriculum and instruction, game design, theories of play and learning, assessment, instructional design, and technology innovation.

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