Game Approaches

It is envisioned that the DfS game will become a type of “affinity space” (Jenkins 2006) or “learning ecology” (Barron 2006 quoted in Greenhow et al 2009) enabling teachers, their peers and (sometimes) their students to develop and share ideas for integrating the DfS and mapping resources into classroom activities. The game may also benefit from participants' existing roles in multiple affinity groups (Gee 2003) that form around “insiders” (Gee 2003: 27) in a specific institution or, say, a subject area, teaching level, etc.

Playfulness around place and location is an active, diverse and creative area in which there is renewed interest due to the emergence of location aware devices (e.g. smart phones). In the Headmap Manifesto (Russell 1999) ludic notions around location and space are experimented with and the influence of such re-imagining of experience and relationships with “geography” and 'location” can clearly be seen in games such as Mission: Explore (Geography Collective 2010a), a geography game for children. Both offer challenging conceptualisations of location that play with expectations:

“Think of all spaces that are lost, the rooms, the places; where are the stories that could illuminate them and tell where they are”

Russell (1999:19).

Geography Collective (2010a: “Make an Earth Sandwich”)

The great strength of this type of activity is the imagination and flexibility displayed. For DfS the game must inspire similar engaging creativity but it must do so in a way that is more practical and containable since:

“Setting student expectations as to the point and value of a game is key to its acceptability and success, particularly when working with more mature adult learners with time pressures and a greater need to be convinced of the benefits of learning with computer games”

(Whitton 2010:81)

The Alternate Reality Game (or ARG as defined by e.g. Whitton (2010:199)), in which both real and online worlds intersect over the course of a wide range of ongoing activities linked by an overarching narrative, thus offers the most suitable form. As well as suiting intersections between real locations and digital mapping it also provides a safe environment for players to experiment in since it is participation and collaboration that is most highly values in ARGs.