Author: Katie Piatt

Welcome to March everyone, how about we start with a puzzle? Name the ‘March‘ themed movies from these emoji clues:

1. 👧👧👧👧👧
2. 👣🐧🐧
3. 🤫🏠❷

Guess on Twitter with the #PlayLearn hashtag and if you think these are hard, then feel free to share your own!

Our featured member for March is games designer Jana Wendler. Read about her bottle cap fanaticism!

What’s coming up this year, you ask?

• [update: this event has been postponed] The next PLA in-person meet up is in a few weeks time on 26/27 March at City University, London on the theme of Playfulness at Work. The event will run from lunchtime on Thursday 26th until lunchtime on Friday 27th. There are 8 spots remaining if you want to join us – Book Now!
• July 8th – 10th is the 2020 Playful Learning Conference, at the University of Leicester – thanks to all of you who have offered sessions. Registration is still available at bargain Early Bird rates until the end of March – and think about students of yours who might want to go: there are special rates for them.
• The European Conference on Games Based Learning (ECGBL) is in the UK this year. If you fancy a trip to Brighton in late September, do check it out and note the call for papers closes this Wednesday so be quick!

What’s going on with you?

This round-up comes out during the first week of each month. If there is any playful activity/event/book/idea you’d like to promote to members in April, then email Katie Piatt or tweet #PlayLearn and we’ll include it!

Each month we will introduce a PLA member through 5 photos telling their Playful Learning journey. This month, we introduce you to…

Jana Wendler: a physical games designer and creative facilitator based in Manchester, and director of social enterprise Playfuel Games. She describes herself as a ‘fringe academic’ and her work focuses on building links between research and creative practice.

This is me wearing a cool-looking brain scanner at the urban games festival PlayPublik in Krakow, Poland, back in 2014. We were testing an experimental street game that combined drones, brain scanners and performance. These festivals and collaborations were the starting point for me to not only play but create games.

I love how urban, street or physical games (whatever you want to call them) bring play into unusual spaces and allow us to explore complex issues in powerful new ways. This is one team’s moment of happy success in Downpour!, a street game we created about flood risk management in Manchester.

I work with researchers from many different fields, from immunology to environmental science, and learning about their research is one of the most exciting parts of my practice. One recent project was a game about health data science, with some very interesting discussions about data linkage, security and anonymity.

Bottle caps are my favourite ever material! They are great for prototyping, for game design workshops and (with added LEDs) as play material for a club version of Turtle Wushu. Exploring different materials and their tactility and affordances is a really important and fun part of the physical game design process.

[Editor’s note: I remember playing Turtle Wushu with Jana in 2014 at a previous PLA event…there’s even photo evidence of this!]

Play and games have a great potential to engage people in conversations.  I currently work on a community sensitisation project in Nairobi, Kenya. Together with a group of community champions we developed creative activities that spread the word about a forthcoming research project on child lung health. This is our version of a game called ‘Blind Striker’ which illustrates the research process.

---

Thanks for sharing your story and your photos Jana.

If you are unlucky, you might be selected as next month’s sacrifice chosen member – we will be in touch!

News from the PLA:

• The next PLA in-person meet up is booked for 26/27 March at City University, London on the theme of Playfulness at Work. The event will run from lunchtime on Thursday 26th until lunchtime on Friday 27th. Book Now!
• July 8th – 10th is the 2020 Playful Learning Conference, held again at the University of Leicester. Call for sessions is now open: get your playful ideas in before the 7th February deadline (that’s this Friday!). Registration is also now open at Early Bird rates.

News from our members:

• Icepops call for papers closes on the 24th Feb – for those interested in playful approaches to copyright, scholarly comms and information literacy! (Bonus points for the excellently playful Icepops acronym!)
• Alison James is investigating the use and value of play in higher education, with a special strand focussing on play for the teaching of management theories and concepts. Alison would like to talk to colleagues worldwide (via this survey) about their experiences and their reasons for resistance to play . All project information can be found on her website .
• 2020 sees the first Warwick Education Fringe which brings spaces to discover, experiment, create and share new ideas about teaching and learning by exploring the power of play. Jennie Milss invites your proposals to run any playful learning related event during May. To propose an event contact via the online form or email educationfringe@warwick.ac.uk
• ‘Making Smart Cities More Playable‘ (Book Review) in the Journal of Play in Adulthood by PLA member Mia Pledger.

February Member Profile: Meet Daisy Abbott and learn about LARPs pirates and failing your research degree…

What’s going on with you?

This round-up comes out during the first week of each month. If there is any playful activity/event/book/idea you’d like to promote to members in March, then email or Tweet Katie and we’ll include it!

Each month we will introduce a PLA member through 5 photos telling their Playful Learning journey. This month, we introduce you to…

Daisy Abbott: an interdisciplinary researcher and research developer based in the School of Simulation and Visualisation at Glasgow School of Art.

This picture was taken about 7 years ago. I look badass! I think physicality can be really important for gaming, in my experience it really adds to emotional engagement and therefore fun. Also dressing up is cool.

I play in a large UK Live Action Roleplay (LARP, or LRP if you prefer) game called Empire. I also do their maps – have a look. I have a research interest in map design to encourage game behaviours. It’s very different to representative mapping.

Here I am running a prototype of my game “How to Fail Your Research Degree” at a conference. This is the game that really started me out as a fully-fledged educational game designer. You can find out much more about the game and read about the research behind it.

It’s very, very loosely based on a board game called Galaxy Trucker. I’m really interested in failure as a game mechanic and ‘productive failure’ as a pedagogical method.

Also if you teach postgrads you should get the game. It’s great 😀

I got these dice at the Playful Learning conference in 2018. I traded someone some dubloons for a second die. As soon as I got home I started using them to get my reluctant son to practice his (admittedly boring) piano scales. One die defines the key, the other defines how to play it (both hands parallel, left hand only, chords etc.) A treasure chest means he gets to choose and two chests means he gets a choccy. He’s still using them for this nearly two years later… Gamification works.

Pirating it up at my son’s school during Maths Week in 2019. I created several maths trails using the Actionbound app for kids to do with their parents outside school hours and also arranged a treasure hunt within school hours. It was quite challenging! (Lesson, children will want to steal your treasure props rather than the prizes you have arranged for them to take away… bring extra treasure props!)

I go to escape rooms a lot. It’s an addiction.

---

Thanks for sharing your story and your photos Daisy.

If you are unlucky, you might be selected as next month’s sacrifice chosen member – we will be in touch!

Welcome back Playful Learning Association members – we hope you all had a good break, got some nice new games to play and are up for more playful learning in 2020!

And here’s what you missed:

• PLA member Julia Reeve, from De Montfort University, attended the Lego Serious Play Conference in December and has shared her observations: https://writingpad.our.dmu.ac.uk/2019/12/04/return-to-legoland-international-lego-serious-play-conference-29th-30th-october-2019/ Thanks Julia!
• Co-chair Alex Moseley is getting a group together of people who are already using Lego Serious Play in HE, to share experiences. If this is you, then email Alex on am14@leicester.ac.uk
• PLA members Katie Piatt and Rachelle O’Brien ran a #LTHEchat on the topic of Playful Learning Technologies in December. A full record of the chat is available on Wakelet.
• For our members in (or due to visit) Ireland, TU Dublin Blanchardstown are hosting the one-day Using Games to Teach 2020 symposium on 13th February. It’s free to attend – but is filling up fast apparently!
• For those interested in the use of games in the teaching of History, Warwick are hosting a symposium on 28th February on the Past and Future of History and Games. No registration details yet, but watch that space (or contact Esther directly).

Member Profile: Carmen Ionita – this month we introduce PhD student Carmen and learn about her interactive learning experiences, like Twister…with a Twist!

What’s coming up this year?

• The next PLA in-person meet up in booked for 26/27 March at City University, London. The event will run from lunchtime on Thursday 26th until lunchtime on Friday 27th. More information and booking instructions to follow, but block it out in your diary now!
• July 8th – 10th is the 2020 Playful Learning Conference, held again at the University of Leicester. Call for sessions is now open: get your playful ideas in before the 7th February deadline! Registration is also now open at Early Bird rates.

What’s going on with you?

This round-up comes out during the first week of each month. If there is any playful activity/event/book/idea you’d like to promote to members in February, then email or Tweet Katie and we’ll include it!

Each month we will introduce a PLA member through 5 photos telling their Playful Learning journey. This month, we introduce you to…

Carmen Ionita: Final year PhD student in Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Manchester, involved in public engagement and science communication projects using interactive learning experiences.

This is me wearing an EEG cap to show how participants in my experiments look like. I like using this picture when I am running science communication events (for young audiences in particular) because it creates a more friendly space by looking less serious in front of them.

During British Science Week one of the activities I designed aimed to explain what brain connectivity means and how different brain regions communicate when we are performing various tasks. What better way to show this than playing Twister…with a twist.

When running events for primary school children I used play-doh to explain the structure of a neuron and then we created a network to show how neurons communicate. Less visible in this picture are the cake sprinkles we used to show different neurotransmitters that carry messages between neurons.

Being passionate about puzzles and escape rooms, I wanted to create an escape box about memory and brain research. But first I had to play many of these boxes myself to get some inspiration – EXIT boxes were the basis for the Big Brain Box. It was such an enjoyable process to play for “work” that it didn’t feel like work at all.

With help from many people, a first version of the Big brain Box has been created. It involves a series of 10 puzzles which, once solved, ‘unlock’ learning messages about the brain and memory. This is a beta version, as my learning from playing the game with more than 200 students and 2 adult groups (experts in game design for HE and youth work) is that it needs to go through several stages before becoming a game. The next stage involves fixing some bugs we identified and integrating the feedback we received so far.

---

Thanks for sharing your story and your photos Carmen.

If you are unlucky, you might be selected as next month’s sacrifice chosen member – we will be in touch!

And here’s what you missed…

22 Playful Learning members met at the University of Manchester on Nov 21st/22nd to focus on playful approaches to student health and wellbeing. You can catch-up through our ‘Live notes’ from the event. Thanks to Jane Mooney for hosting us!

The event also included our first co-Chair election as Nicola Whitton steps down and Katie Piatt takes the reins alongside Alex Moseley!

Who’s Who

Our regular member profile features this month features Sam Aston from the University of Manchester.

Over to you

The PLA holds two 24 hour face-to-face meetings a year (typically in November and March) and then organises the July Playful Learning Conference. We are looking for volunteers to host our March (Spring) PLA meet-up, ideally in the London/Midlands area – we like to move around the country to give everyone a chance to attend. The host only needs to book a room at their institution, and lay on (ideally) lunch for 20(ish) people on arrival and teas and coffees from the Thursday lunchtime till the Friday lunchtime. They can also get as involved as they want in setting the theme and agenda for the event. Interested? Drop Katie an email to discuss.

The Journal of Play in Adulthood has a special call for papers out now (deadline for abstracts, Dec 10th)!

Who’s excited about the Playful Learning Conference 2020!

July 8th – 10th, University of Leicester
Call for sessions is now open.

What’s going on with you?

This round-up comes out during the first week of each month. If there is any playful activity/event/book/idea you’d like to promote to members in January, then email or Tweet Katie and we’ll include it!

Each month we will introduce a PLA member through 5 photos telling their Playful Learning journey. This month, we introduce you to…

Sam Aston, Learning Development Librarian, The University of Manchester Library

So as a Librarian my profession is not associated with play but let’s face it, the librarians’ specialness to travel through time and space places them in strong position to have the capacity to overcome challenges, achieve targets and drink lots of tea.

Being a part of a community of practice for play is hugely important to share and practice ideas with each other so attending conferences and the Playful Learning Association is of value.

Designing playful games and interactions I often play the game/interaction with others to assess what might need tweaking. This goes for both online and face to face interactions.

Designing activities and games for learning I usually incorporate games that I recall from my childhood, my 10 year old is a huge inspiration for these activities.

As part of my approach to designing classes across a range of disciplines I incorporate creative activity based exercises where students can practice skills in a safe environment so that they feel confident to use the strategy within their practice.

---

Thanks for sharing your story and your photos Sam.

If you are unlucky, you might be selected as next month’s sacrifice chosen member – we will be in touch!

Upcoming opportunities to write, attend and play:

• Book reviewer wanted! The Journal of Play in Adulthood has been sent a copy of “Making Smart Cities More Playable” for review – if you’d like a smart hardback copy (to keep) in return for a review of the book (approx. 750 – 1,000 words, preferably in around 4 weeks after receiving the book), then please drop Andrew (a.p.walsh@hud.ac.uk) a note saying why you’d be suitable to review it for the journal.
• The journal also has a special call for papers out now!
• There’s a ‘Play Well‘ exhibition on at the Wellcome Collection now until March. If you get a chance to go along, please tell us what you think!
• Abstract deadline fast approaching (14th Oct) for Transform MedEd. If you use games or playful learning in medical education, do consider putting an abstract in.

Meet Darren! Each month we will introduce a PLA member through photos telling their Playful Learning journey. This month we feature Darren Edwards. Darren’s story features uneventful periods, crap games and inadvertent coordination!

PLA News:

• Our next event is Nov 21st/22nd at the University of Manchester, focussing on the Role of Playfulness in Health and Wellbeing. The event is fully booked – but stick yourself on the waiting list, just in case! We will attempt to live blog the event, so keep on eye on Twitter #PlayLearn. 
• Nicola Whitton will be standing down as PLA co-Chair in November. Following last month’s nomination process, voting is now open. Voting will close on Thursday November 21st at 5pm. The results of the vote will be announced during the PLA meeting in Manchester.
• Congratulations! Friend of the PLA, Sam Illingworth’s ‘Carbon City Zero’ game has been fully funded on Kickstarter. Sam has created a deck-building card game where players race to create the first zero carbon city.

Hope to see many of you in Manchester later in the month – and if you aren’t there, remember to use #PlayLearn on Twitter to share your news and stay in touch.

Each month we will introduce a PLA member through 5 photos telling their Playful Learning journey.

Darren Edwards, Senior Library Assistant, Destination and Culture, BCP Council
BCP Council is responsible for local government services in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole.

I have been interested in games and play all my life. My interest developed from Choose your own Adventure novels as a child to Warhammer and videogames as a teenager. At University I was introduced to Dungeons and Dragons, live roleplay and modern board-games and I haven’t looked back.

Initially my love of games and my career didn’t mix, but after my short and uneventful period working in spatial ecologist I decided to work in public libraries full-time. Here I was able to join my love of games with my job, helping start a junior chess club and tabletop gaming club that continue running today.

I was introduced to the world of playful learning back in 2014, through one of Andrew Walsh’s game design for information literacy workshops. Here I am explaining the crap game we made in that workshop

My work using games and play in public libraries has been focussed on building communities around games and encouraging family learning around STEM using play.

In 2015 I offered to volunteer for International Game Day at Your Library (now International Games Week), inadvertently becoming the UK coordinator for the initiative. International Games Week (IGW) is the flagship initiative of the American Library Association Games and Gaming Roundtable with the aim of connecting communities through the power of games.

Thanks for sharing your story and your photos Darren.

If you are unlucky, you might be selected as next month’s sacrifice chosen member – we will be in touch!