RumbleBlocks: Teaching science concepts to young children through a Unity game

Author

Christel, Michael G. ; Stevens, Scott M. ; Maher, Bryan S. ; Brice, Sean ; Champer, Matt ; Jayapalan, Luke ; Chen, Qiaosi ; Jin, Jing ; Hausmann, Daniel ; Bastida, Nora ; Zhang, Xun ; Aleven, Vincent ; Koedinger, Kenneth ; Chase, Catherine ; Harpstead, Er

Author_Institution

Entertainment Technol. Center, Carnegie Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA, USA

fYear

2012

fDate

July 30 2012-Aug. 1 2012

Firstpage

162

Lastpage

166

Abstract

RumbleBlocks was developed at the Entertainment Technology Center (ETC) to teach engineering principles of tower stability to children ages 4-7. The game features tower construction, tower piece removal, and tower comparison levels which were designed with feedback from early childhood educators and learning researchers, and iteratively improved with feedback from child play tests. This paper emphasizes the development process, and initial formative play tests with children. It was developed using the Unity3D game engine, allowing for export as a stand-alone application, web player, or to mobile devices. First results are promising in terms of educational effectiveness, with more studies planned for the future.

Keywords

Internet; age issues; computer aided instruction; computer games; engineering education; mobile computing; teaching; ETC; Entertainment Technology Center; RumbleBlocks; Unity3D game engine; Web player; child play test feedback; early-childhood educator feedback; learning researcher feedback; mobile devices; science concept teaching; stand-alone application; tower comparison levels; tower construction; tower piece removal; tower stability engineering principle teaching; young children; Earthquakes; Education; Engines; Games; Marine vehicles; Poles and towers; Educational game; Unity game engine; early childhood science education; game development process;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Computer Games (CGAMES), 2012 17th International Conference on

Conference_Location

Louisville, KY

Print_ISBN

978-1-4673-1120-5

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/CGames.2012.6314570

Filename

6314570