Event Title

SSA18 - Designing Learning Adventures with Playground City

Presenter Information

Kelsey Kerce
Wes Shaffer

Location

PSY-228B

Streaming Media

Start Date

4-11-2017 3:15 PM

Description

Playground City believes learning is everywhere, all the time. We also believe learning can be fun, yet today's youth have become disillusioned with the traditional classroom model, which "teaches to the test." While technology and data are innovating at staggering rates, our education system is not providing a solid foundation for our youth to succeed in this information/digital age. In our quest to make learning more fun and to better prepare youth for bright futures, we infuse play into everything we do. We strive to find learning pathways through a system of "connected learning." Connected learning integrates personal interest, peer relationships, and achievement in academic, civic, or career-relevant areas. Youth learn best when they are actively creating and engaging and when they feel encouraged by peer support. Playground City uses human-centered design to create playful learning pathways to inspire a passion for lifelong learning with a connected learning mindset. We work to identify the experience that takes youth from "hanging out" to "geeking out." Where does the point of interest become deeper and then progress to passion? For many of our youth in underserved neighborhoods, exposure is a critical first step. This workshop will include 15 minutes of lecture and approximately 45 minutes of breakout sessions - 3 period of 5 minutes lecture and 15 minutes breakout session. These periods will be broken up into three topics: 1) a discourse on how human-centered design calls on curriculum writers to create with youth and a "how might we?" session geared toward identifying educational challenges; 2) the educational "playlist," a series of learning experiences that result in a competency (e.g., three experiences that teach the basics of growing a plant are sprouting a seed, figuring out odd places where plants can grow, and breathing near a plant to understand the basics of photosynthesis) and rapid prototyping of potential playlists; and 3) badging (i.e., how the awarding of badges can result in equity by providing academic, civic, and career opportunities for those with recognized badges by credentialing non-traditional learning) and brainstorm in groups to discuss what opportunities badges might "unlock" within the community (e.g., a civic engagement badge might unlock a job shadow opportunity at City Hall).