Articles & Books about Games for Learning
NY Times Article - Learning by Playing Video Games
Washington Post Article - Educational gaming in Fairfax public schools
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A Theory of Fun for Game Design
A Theory of Fun for Game Design features a novel way of showing interactive designers how to improve their designs to incorporate the highest degree of fun. The book has a unique format of text and thought-provoking illustrations. Already endorsed by major players in the gaming world – such as BoingBoing, Noah Falstein, and Henry Jenkins of MIT – A Theory of Fun covers such essential topics as: Why some games are fun and others boring, Why making a game too hard—or too easy—is a mistake, Why games have to balance deprivation and overload, order and chaos, silence and noise, The difference between designing content and creating an experience, Why both adults and children like to play games, How playing a game and learning are connected, The ethics of entertainment |
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Engaging Learning: Designing e-Learning Simulation Games
Clark Quinn (a.k.a. Quinnovator) presents an enhanced instructional design model that is grounded in the concepts of cognitive apprenticeship, situated learning, constructivism, and the Zone of Proximal Development |
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The Art of Game Design: A book of lenses
 Anyone can master the fundamentals of game design - no technological expertise is necessary. The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses shows that the same basic principles of psychology that work for board games, card games and athletic games also are the keys to making top-quality videogames. Good game design happens when you view your game from many different perspectives, or lenses. While touring through the unusual territory that is game design, this book gives the reader one hundred of these lenses - one hundred sets of insightful questions to ask yourself that will help make your game better. These lenses are gathered from fields as diverse as psychology, architecture, music, visual design, film, software engineering, theme park design, mathematics, writing, puzzle design, and anthropology. Anyone who reads this book will be inspired to become a better game designer - and will understand how to do it. |
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Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals
Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman present a unified model for looking at all kinds of games, from board games and sports to computer and video games. Building an aesthetics of interactive systems, Salen and Zimmerman define core concepts like "play," "design," and "interactivity." They look at games through a series of eighteen "game design schemas," or conceptual frameworks, including games as systems of emergence and information, as contexts for social play, as a storytelling medium, and as sites of cultural resistance. As active participants in game culture, the authors have written Rules of Play as a catalyst for innovation, filled with new concepts, strategies, and methodologies for creating and understanding games. Written for game scholars, game developers, and interactive designers, Rules of Play is a textbook, reference book, and theoretical guide. It is the first comprehensive attempt to establish a solid theoretical framework for the emerging discipline of game design. |
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Learning objectives
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Games for Learning 
