Students’ Collective Creativity while Co-Constructing Digital Games on the Idea of Sustainable City

Eirini Tsouma, tsouma_e@hotmail.com

Educational Technology Lab, Dept of Pedagogy, School of Philosophy, University of Athens

Maria Daskolia, mdaskol@ppp.uoa.gr

Environmental Education Lab, Dept of Pedagogy, School of Philosophy, University of Athens

Abstract

The study reported here presents a work-in-progress focusing on how students’ engagement with playing, de-constructing and constructing digital games microworlds on the idea of sustainable city was used as a means for fostering collective creativity.

Keywords

Constructionism, collective creativity, sustainability, sustainable city, digital game design

Rationale and Context of our Study in Brief

Digital game play, design and construction are acknowledged as important contexts for collective creative engagement and production.  From the Vygotskian view highlighting children’s social play as an important condition for the development of their imagination, to current theorising pointing out digital game literacy as contributing to the enhancement of digital wisdom, creativity is identified, although not explicitly, as an inherent dimension of game play processes. However, it is the constructionist school of thought (Kafai, 1995; Resnick, 2007) that extended the creative potential of children’s engagement with digital games from sole game playing to game design and construction. Collaboration among members of a group being involved in playing, designing and creating their own digital games is argued to enhance collective creativity.

Design-based research was used as the method format of the study. The game microworlds that were collaboratively created show a varying degree of imaginative thinking production. Our analysis aims to illustrate how constructionist activity can enhance the students’ collective creativity both in terms of acquiring game design skills and on developing a better awareness of the sustainability concept. The study is part of the Metafora project, a 3-year EU-funded project.

References

Kafai, Y. (1995). Minds in Play: Computer Game Design As A Context for Children's Learning. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Resnick, M. (2007). All I Really Need to Know (About Creative Thinking) I Learned (By Studying How Children Learn) in Kindergarten. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Creativity and Cognition. Washington, D.C.