Pedagogical Dramas and Transformational Play

Narratively Rich Games for Learning

Bibliographic Data

ID18985180
AuthorsSasha A Barab (Indiana University Bloomington, corresponding author), Tyler Dodge (Indiana University Bloomington), Adam Ingram-Goble, Adam Ingram‐goble (Indiana University Bloomington), Patrick Pettyjohn (Indiana University Bloomington), Kylie Peppler (0000-0002-5472-4974, Indiana University Bloomington), Charlene Volk (Indiana University Bloomington), Maria Solomou (Indiana University Bloomington)
Year2010
Volume17
Issue3
Pages235-264
Publication date2010-07-28
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueMind Culture and Activity (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1074-9039 • E-ISSN: 1532-7884
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/10749030903437228
OpenAlexW2067806926
LanguageEN
Citations received10
References cited35

Although every era is met with the introduction of powerful technologies for entertainment and learning, videogames represent a new contribution binding the two and bearing the potential to create sustained engagement in a curricular drama where the player's knowledgeable actions shape an unfolding fiction within a designed world. Although traditionally, stories involve an author, a performer, and an audience, much of the power of videogames as media for advancing narrative springs from their affordance for the player to occupy more than one role—and sometimes all three—simultaneously. In the narratively rich videogames that we design, players have the opportunity to perform actions, experience consequences, and reflect on the underlying social values that these situations were designed to engage, affording a type of narrative transactivity. Elsewhere we have discussed designing these media as contexts for engaging academic content; here we illuminate the power of videogames to engage children in ideological struggles as they are experienced in game-based adaptations of classic literature. Toward this end, we present our theoretical argument for the power of games as a contemporary story medium, grounding this discussion in the context of two game design projects and their implementations. Implications are discussed in terms of the potential of immersive, interactive media—videogame technology, in short—for achieving wide-ranging educational ends

Aesthetics · Affordance · Art · Drama · Entertainment · Game design · Human–computer interaction · Literature · Multimedia · Narrative · Social media · Sociology · Visual arts · World Wide Web · Computer Science · Digital Games and Media · Educational Games and Gamification · History · Psychology · Teaching and Learning Programming

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub