Game Based Learning (GBL) Faculty Interest Group (FIG) – Notes from Meeting

Friday, Sep 25, 2020, 12pm via Zoom

Grace Axler-DiPerte, Facilitator

Participants:   Grace Axler-DiPerte (KCC BIO), Christina Colon (KCC BIO), Daniel Kane (KCC TAT), Tom Lavazzi (KCC ENG), Elizabeth Mulligan (KCC BIO), Lilja Nielsen (KCC BIO), Kathleen Offenholley (BMCC MAT), Cynthia Olvina (KCC MENTAL HEALTH), Mary Ortiz (KCC BIO), Michael Ortiz (KCC BEH), Nancy Rowland (KCC SURG TECH)

Meeting began at 12:00pm.

1. Grace welcomed everyone. We did introductions because we had some new people join.
2. Grace summarized from the pre-semester surveys what we all hope to get out of this FIG. Basically, we want to find ways and get ideas to engage and inspire our students.
3. We discussed Kahoot, a low stakes game we can use in class.
4. Daniel shared eSports, a competitive (for scholarships) game (like Fortnight).
5. We discussed that many of us are teaching asynchronously so it is hard to do games online. We should try things, and if they don’t work , we don’t have to do them again.
6. Tom shared a game he uses called McDonald’s Game (https://molleindustria.org/mcdonalds/). It teaches market structure.  It is from Mollein Industrial (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molleindustria )
7. We can use Google to search for videos and/or simulations for use in our classes. These are not games, but they can be interactive to engage the students.
8. The CDC website has “Solve the Outbreak” that can be used to teach epidemiology.
9. Christina has tried to come up with activities that do not require technology, such as creating an organism like Mary did in class.
10. Kathleen shared a synchronous game. Count to 10.  The moderator starts with zero, then one-by-one the class starts counting, beginning with one.  If two people say a number at the same time, you must start all over again.  It’s a great icebreaker.  It’s hard than it sounds.  We tried it and only got to 7.  This could be modified (ex. use a Fibonacci sequence).
11. Grace shared an asynchronous game she made using the Bitmoji app. She used Google Slides and imported as PDF or PPT.  She did this in Google Classroom.  She had a green board with the meeting agenda on it.  You can make it look like a classroom in a more interactive way.
12. Grace shared that next time we will look at Escape Room ( Harry Potter, Dewey Decimal System).
13. Grace shared that in Microbiology she does patient diagnosis and plans to set up a virtual clinic.
14. Grace shared Google Slides in Google Chrome and showed how to do this. We can set up a “classroom” with “walls” and a “floor”.  She went through how to set up the slides.  We can also use Google Forms with Google Slides and Google Classroom.  You can set up an escape room, a virtual lab, a business, a multi-step problem, etc. with this.  You can download Google Suite and it has Slides, Classroom, etc.  Here’s a resource:

https://docs.google.com/presentation

Look for “google slides escape room template”.  PPT Jeopardy has templates, too.  Don’t re-invent the wheel.  Google has a “How to make a Google active classroom slide” video.  See the Google Escape Room topic in this.  Discussion followed.  Start off simple and then make it more complex.

15. Beth shared “Badges”. How do you reward students virtually? She uses achievement badges.  On Blackboard in Course Tools, go to Achievements and then “Custom”.  Beth walked us through the process to create and use badges.  We can use these to lighten our workload.  Maybe we can put ourselves of the line by doing something whimsical if students get X number of badges, such as singing or playing he guitar, or wearing a funny hat.  Discussion followed.
16. Grace mentioned Up-goer 5. It can be used to explain complex concepts in common language.  Discussion followed.
17. For the next meeting, if we have items to discuss, send them to Grace. At the next meeting Grace will try Escape Room with us.
18. The next meeting with be 10/30/20 at 12:30PM.
19. Meeting ended at 1pm.

Notes respectfully submitted by Mary Theresa Ortiz, KCC Bio

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