City of Ember Comes to Lang & Lit!

Gross' Gamification!

Dear Readers,

Ever since I read Explore Like a Pirate: Gamification and Game Inspired Course Design to Engage, Enrich and Elevate Your Learners by Michael Matera, I have wanted to gamify my classroom. 

Not being a gamer myself, it is definitely an area of instruction outside my comfort zone. I have read the book a couple of times (I am currently on my third reading) and lurked in the #XPLAP weekly chat when I am able. The community is sincerely one of the most gracious and collaborative I have met. 

I strongly encourage you to subscribe to Michael's Youtube channel. 

@mrmatera Finding the Joy in the Journey

My Theme

I wanted my theme to be literature related and tried to think of the ultimate fantasy worlds and settings. It came to me, The City of Ember. 

Creating the Setting

• It was easy to replicate the feeling of being underground by turning off the lights and closing the shades. I also have a tree with lights on it, plan on buying Christmas lights to string around the board and purchase a couple of flashlights.
• I created a space that looks like a "greenhouse" with a fake tree, flowers, leaves, a runner and pumpkin. When it is flourishing, it will all remain there, but if the city starts to deteriorate, it will be easy to take those away. I covered the counter with brown packaging paper to simulate the ground if all the vegetation dies. 
• I found black paper decorations that will indicate a blackout. I have 5 total, the more that are hung, the longer the blackout will be.
• The light-bulb was easy to create using paint, glitter and art paper. It is the focus of our game board.

Creating the Collaborative Badges 

(will be earned based on group challenges)

The badges represent the various assignments from the City of Ember. I have attached other items for when the students are involved in a quest or challenge. The emojis are the badges that students will earn. The shapes will be part of the game corresponding to the badges they can earn.

Badges: emoji faces

Game Pieces: bags, raffle tickets, shapes

• The Messenger: They wear red jackets so the red paper bags and raffle tickets represent their role. Messengers usually are happy to deliver most requests so I chose a smiley emoji. To coordinate with them I have chosen a yellow heart.
• Pipeworks: The Pipeworkers wear orange. They usually have bad news to deal with. I chose a worried emoji and an orange star for them.
• The Greenhouse Helper: They deal with growing things and worry about the food supply in Ember. I chose a sad green face, green bag and raffle tickets to correspond to them. I also chose a green clover.
• Cheats: The "cheats" to me represent an idea. I chose little raffles with Bright Idea along with pink bags and the sunglasses emoji. I also am using a pink thumbs up.
• Black-Out: The citizens get terrified when they have a black-out so I chose the scared emoji in purple with the corresponding purple bag.

There are 5 different badges the students will have the opportunity to earn throughout a 10 week period (1 marking quarter). Approximately every couple of weeks they will participate in a class wide quest or challenge.

Creating Individual Badges

(to be earned independently)

Schoology has a variety of badges that can be assigned to students. I was able to correlate them with Covey's Habits of Highly Effective Teens as we are a Leader in Me and Lighthouse accredited middle school. They will have the opportunity to earn each of the following badges weekly:

• Good Listener (Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood)
• Participation (Synergize)
• Positive Attitude (Think Win-Win)
• Problem Solver (Be Proactive)
• Star Performer (Find Your Voice and Help Others Find Theirs)

I also taught myself how to create my own. They can also earn:

• Weekly Status of the Class (Put First Things First)
• Monthly Status of the Class (Sharpen the Saw)

Break-Out Box (Break-In Lockers)

To kick off our Gamification Investigative Journalism unit, we are going to use a Break-Out Box. I am also fortunate to have lockers in my classroom that are not currently being used by students. I have access to approximately 8-10 lockers that I can incorporate into the lessons.

Players

What is a game without players? I wrote each of my 8th grader's names on index cards and hung them on the game board. Then asked them to create a "Gamertag" name and a strength they offer to the group. Some students found this challenging and others knew their strength right away. 

The Story

One of the first steps in creating a Break-Out is to begin with a story to hook your students and set the scene. I know I would be setting the stage for an entire quarter. 

I was able to incorporate the IB-MYP Learner Profile Traits (we are an IB-MYP accredited middle school), as well as the district's Pal-Mac Way (character education). Additionally, I was able to incorporate The Habits as well. Here is a draft of a story idea:

Dear Journalists,

We are starting our Investigative Journalism unit and you are going to learn to write like a journalist. Your first assignment will be to write about The City of Ember. However, in order to do this, you must go undercover as citizens of the community. Be warned, the mayor is not kind to outsiders and will do anything to prevent his city from learning about the above ground world.

To give you a little background, at one time the mayors of Ember wanted to protect their people from all the negative effects of war, famine, climate change, etc. In order to do that, they built an underground city. The mayors knew the city would not sustain itself forever, so they set a locked box to open in 200 years, which would provide instructions for moving out of the underground world.

However, the box was tucked away and when the time came for it to open, there was nobody to receive the instructions. Life in Ember continued, but the city started to deteriorate. One of the most devastating events is the break down of the generator which causes city wide black-outs. If the generator is not repaired, the city could be enveloped in permanent blackness.

You have the ability to uncover the secrets and save the people of Ember. It will take collaboration, problem-solving, communication, knowledge and inquiry. You will have to demonstrate the Pal-Mac Way by showing responsibility for your words and actions, respect to people and the physical environment, caring about releasing the people of Ember and exhibiting positive citizenship by being an active participant. 

It is a Win-Win situation for all involved should you succeed! Synergy among the group is essential when solving puzzles to gain access to the lock combinations. You must Seek First to Understand Then to be Understood when working with others. Be an active listener, have an open mind consider other perspectives and gather as much information as possible. 

I wish you the best of luck!

Sincerely,

Ms. Gross

Next Steps

Unfortunately, that is all I can reveal at this point. I do have ideas for:

• Lock Combinations (4-Digit Lock, 3-Digit Lock, a key lock and an ABC Multi-Lock)
• Puzzles/Clues (using the book as inspiration, I have ideas on puzzles they must solve)
• Boxes (there will be one big box to break into followed by a smaller box)

Reflection

It has been a journey that continues. It has taken my about a month to create this much. I would recommend, which was an idea from the book, setting your theme first. Once you have your theme, everything else starts to fall in place. 

I did a lot of collecting of both objects and ideas. Then when I knew my setting, I was able to incorporate them and use them for various badges, game pieces, etc.

Regardless of my minimal gamer background knowledge, it has been an incredible learning experience. It has made me look at instruction differently, it has made me think about our upcoming unit differently, it challenged me to incorporate IB, Covey's Habits and our Pal-Mac Way, in addition to, implementing something relevant to most of my students.

I highly suggest taking the plunge and trying it out! Start as small as you are comfortable with and work up from there. I still need to figure out how to keep track of individual badges so they can "level-up", as well as, gamifying my instruction with quests and challenges. 

Happy gaming!

Warmly,

Teresa