NILE 2008 Talk August 11, 2008
Posted by Miss Collins in : Evaluation , 1 comment so farWell, despite the nerves increasing steadily as more and more (very damp) people sat down in the room, the World Builder Project talk went really on Thursday!
The whole Adventure Author presentation was very well received by a varied audience of teachers, students, game designers, storytellers, writers and university and college experts, especially the part expertly delivered by the charasmatic young Andrew from Dundee! Everyone was very positive about the work we did at Campie and how much everyone involved learned from it. You can see the conference write-up on our presentation and the other great talks at NILE by following the link on our Blogroll to the Adventure Author Blog.
Thank you to everyone who has been following and supporting our blog with your comments and input -it made a huge difference to both the pupils and myself. Please do get in touch if you are interested in knowing more about the planning, delivery and evaluation of this project as there are plenty of digital documents to support it all.
Thank you once again to the Adventure Author team and, of course, to Andrew from Dundee for showing us how calm and humourous we could have been!
Our Project Features in International Conference! August 4, 2008
Posted by Miss Collins in : Evaluation , 4commentsOn Thursday 7th August 2008 the Adventure Author team will be taking part in the Narrative in Interactive Learning Environments 2008 conference, or NILE for short!
The Adventure Author team will be explaining how they use Neverwinter Nights 2 and how they have designed the Fridge Magnets and the Evaluations programmes that we tested for them during our project.
Then….. I will be speaking about our very own World Builder Project and how well it went and just how much the class got out of it! Eek! I am, of course, very proud of what we achieved and so am looking forward to sharing our stories and experiences with the audience.
A pupil from a school in Dundee who has also been creating his game with the AA team will also be there and giving a presentation on what he has learnt from it all.
A Special Award May 30, 2008
Posted by Miss Collins in : Evaluation, Images , 4commentsWe were really pleased that Mrs McCall, Mrs Clark and Mr Wood were able to join us for our presentation on Monday at this busy time of year. And it seems that they were so impressed with the efforts of our class that we were presented with a Certificate of Achievement!
What did you think of World Builder? May 30, 2008
Posted by Miss Collins in : Evaluation , add a commentThe class have very kindly filled out some evaluation forms for me in class this week to let me know what they thought of the project.
Everyone, (no surprises here) loved creating their worlds on the laptops, and some found the conversation writing to be the trickiest part.
Most people were happy enough with the rotation of groups as it meant that everyone had an equal shot. However, it would have been better if we had all had our own computers and had been able to have more time on the games.
Overall the feedback on the language work we did was positive, with most of our activities being rated as ‘Useful’. Story Planners were rated as boring in many cases… no surprises there either!
Lots of pupils felt that they would think more about description in their writing in future and some also said they would consider reading Fantasy now in their own time. Some also mentioned that they learned about working together and working through problems. 
Generally everyone was happy with the project, though lots of people would have liked to have had time to make new levels and to learn about Interiors on the game.
Thank you very much for this feedback and for all your hard work P7b! :) :)
Welcome to Our Worlds! May 22, 2008
Posted by Miss Collins in : Class work, Evaluation , add a commentI am delighted to announce the opening of a new page on our blog: Our Worlds.
Today some people reached the stage where they had completed the first draft of their World Builder story, and many have managed to type their work up. In pairs, those that had finished exchanged stories and, just as they did with the games, gave each other 2 comments about what they thought was really good about the story, and 1 point for development. The stories were then polished using this feedback and they are now ready to share!
Please visit our new page to read these as they are added. Some will also appear as podcasts in the coming week or so.
Testing, testing…. May 19, 2008
Posted by Miss Collins in : Evaluation, Games-Based Learning Links , 3commentsThe moment of truth! The Adventure Author team are with us today and we will be testing each other’s games. The Play Testing will involve evaluating what the terrain is like, the storyline/quest and how enjoyable the game is to play.
All things going well server-wise, we will be posting some comments and new targets for improvements here later today.
