2011
3 March 9.00am (Australian Eastern Daylight Time) Beth Gallaway, the Information Goddess and author of Game on!: gaming at the library, spoke about her work with games and libraries. You can find out more about her from her website, and you can follow her on twitter.

Extra information provided by Beth Gallaway about Scratch (including evaluation statistics).

Franticread (Ellen Forsyth): Hello and welcome to this talk. My name is Ellen Forsyth and I work at the State Library of New South Wales. I would like to acknowledge all the traditional owners of the land.

Lots of people have been looking at the transcripts of the earlier talks. Thanks to @Jackslack and @Variel for this great resource.

The speaker today is Beth Gallaway, Assistant Director at the Haverhill Public Library. As well as being the author of Game on: gaming at the library which is an excellent read Beth was named a Library Journal Mover & Shaker in 2006 for her work in advocating for video games in libraries.

As well as all of this the Beth provides Information Goddess Consulting, as she describes it “is the go-to resource for gaming, technology and youth services training and consulting for public and school libraries, delivering superior continuing education workshops to library staff, in person and online, and providing dynamic and interactive technology and gaming programs to library patrons of all ages”

I am really looking forward to what Beth has to discuss with us today. Over to you Beth.

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): thanks, Ellen! :)

hi everyone :) thanks for inviting me to come chat with you today, I wanted to share a little about what I'm working on lately. It seems I have sort of worked myself OUT of my training / consulting job since so many libraries now have gaming as part of their core service, frankly, I'm delighted! even though it means I had to go back to work full time.

My work of late has shifted from gaming advocacy and providing game programs directly to youth in public libraries to doing game design with youth and trying to elevate gaming programs at my own library with outcome based evaluation and I'm also interested in how we can use installed games like WoW! in libraries so I'll start with that

I love the idea of a game discussion group, have yet to implement it. Is anyone doing that?

Elvabelle: not yet

Hiemal (Liz Danforth) : my library system is using DDO, and having feedback sessions

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): cool, Hiemal!

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): there was an assignment to read McGonigal's WSJ excerpt, and then the group discussed it

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): that's a great variation - discuss something related to gaming

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): one game that I've played with my 8 year old nephew that would be a good one to play and discuss is Wolfquest www.wolfquest.org it's a PC download created & hosted by the Minnesota zoo and it's a simulation game about wolf behavior and ecology. I think one thing that makes it suited to libraries is, you can download versions that will work on PCs with low system requirements.

It would lend itself well to all kinds of discussion, what kind of wolf did you select to represent yourself, what is your play strategy, why are wolves important in terms of conservation, etc it's a complex game, and maybe more of a serious game. Another that would lend itself well to discussion is Passage

Elvabelle: interesting, does it only focus on wolves, or are other animals involved?

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): Wolfquest focuses solely on wolves, Elvabelle :) Has anyone played it? Passage is available for Windows XP; Mac; Linux; & iPhone. In Passage, Two characters meet up and move through a changing terrain, and evolve along the way. The premise of passage is quite ambiguous: Who are they? What’s the backstory? Where are they going? How old are they? What is the game trying to say? and yet, for it's deep message, it's a simple interface: old school pixel graphics, easy controls (arrow keys) and simple repetitive music, down, or back up. The graphics are simple: old school pixels in bright colors. The music is simple and repetitive. The gameplay itself is very short, and could be played at the library, then immediately discussed.

Passage is a is a serious game that inspires conversation; using the game as a writing prompt or for online forum discussion could extend the program beyond the walls of library. If you are interested in serious games that might be ideal for play and discussion, check out Games for Change http://www.gamesforchange.org/

I find that site is more frequently updated than the Serious Games website, http://www.seriousgames.org

I do have an annotated list of digital downloads from games featured in my book, online at http://www.gamesforchange.org/

Does anyone have a favorite digital download game to share right now, that might work for library programming?

Let me move on then, to another type of download that your library gamers might be interested in: Scratch! Scratch is a free program for game design and animation, created and supported by MIT http://scratch.mit.edu It has very low system requirements, so again, perfect for schools or libraries that might not have gaming computers

Elvabelle: our library has issues getting them supported on the public PCs but the younger kids generally really like those supported at ABC for kids

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): Elvabelle, I know there can be issues with networks and where to save stuff.

I say Scratch takes 10 hours to learn and 100 to master and it's easy enough for an 8 year old to use :) One of the most rewarding programs I had the pleasure to facilitate was a 3 week after-school Scratch workshop and instead of asking the participants how they liked it and what we should do differently for next time, we decided to do outcome based evaluations. It seems like libraries are suffering more and more cutbacks in the US, and the UK - I'm not sure what it's like, here in AU :)

The more we can do to demonstrate and document the impact of libraries, and how they change lives the better our chances of survival! so we set out to measure how Scratch changed the lives of the participants, what specific knowledge did they gain? Learning HOW to do something is scratch is measurable, so we measured knowledge of how to make a character (called a sprite) move how to customize the sprite, and make it look a certain way how to add a sound effect how to make the background change, to indicate advancing a level

Elvabelle: that's a fantastic way of easily showing council the impact programmes have

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): the number one thing they wanted to learn was how to shoot things but I insisted we make games where objects are collected, not destroyed :D They also wanted to know how to jump! so we had to learn how to employ the effect of gravity, week to week, the lessons built on one another so we could measure increased skill and comfort level and not just with using scratch!

We measured comfort level with being in the library and asking the librarian for help to demonstrate that programs like this build relationships. The easiest way for me to use OBE is to come up with a short set of questions, and ask participants to self rate on a scale of 1-5 at the beginning (presurvey) and end (postsurvey) of the program then compare the results, matching each participants surveys by using a code (I tell them to put their intials and favorite # on both pages) then I can see growth in 20% increments

Elvabelle: predominantly what age group participated in the programme?

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): this program was for ages 10 & up, participants were mostly middle school, ages 10-14

Elvabelle: ok thanks

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): I do have results and will post them along with links on my blog at http://infogdss.wordpress.com

Here is one sample result, we also did an overview of elements of good game design

• 12.5% of participants reported an increase in knowledge of game design elements
• 50% of participants reported an 40% increase in knowledge of game design elements
• 37.5% of participants reported an60% increase in knowledge of game design elements
  

By far, their favorite part of the session was more free form - designing custom backgrounds and sprites :)

It's a very replicable program, and I'm happy to share the data and handouts and agendas :) questions?

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): creative freeplay -- sounds wonderful. I'm fascinated with taking the ideas of gaming the next step onward

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): I will also post the grid I used on National gaming day, in November, to track activities every 30 minutes - it's another interesting way to evaluate a gaming program, without doing a straight door count

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): I'm delighted to hear how you're doing it

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): Thank you so much, Hiemal:)

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): just putting games out to play is good... this is better

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): I think if we want people to take it seriously, we need to get serious about evaluation

Franticread (Ellen Forsyth): it is really great to hear about the evaluation too - as a core part not an add on

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): Well, the evaluation is related to the program goals, and that really IS the core piece :)

Hiemal (Liz Danforth) says: it's SOP for us too, but less detailed

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): When I inadvertently Blinked earlier...I was TRYING to type that I've had some good luck with combining online and tabletop. In this case, Tsuro with Entanglement, which is a Flash game

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): how? :)

Elvabelle: what sort of games are you combining?

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): We put out a few of the laptop lab computers -- the Flash game can handle multiplayers on the same computer -- and have Tsuro set up to play at another table

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): i <3 Tsuro :)

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): Me too :)

Let people engage at whatever level and tech they like. At the end, though, we were able to award prizes for top Entanglement scores

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): nifty! :)

(Liz Danforth): I am coming to the conclusion that, if gaming events are lethargic (and I'm hearing many are) ...making even a gesture at being a direct competitive tournament is helpful. People CAN play anywhere, they cannot COMPETE just anywhere

Elvabelle: we often run a Wii sport tournament in the school hols and it's very popular

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): yes, competition often elevates the experience

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): my particular branch is considering dropping away from regular (weekly, even monthly) events in order to do bigger quarterly tournaments, people turn out for that kind of thing but getting them in the door for "everyday" events hasn't been as successful -- and dang, but we've tried everything :(

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): switching to design - content creation - may be another strategy. I've had success using the Cartoon Network's Game Creator http://www.cartoonnetwork.com/games/gamecreators/

Maxwelig: has anyone been more successful in getting a group started for these types of events in their libraries?

Elvabelle: Randwick is just starting out with gaming. We are thinking dungeon and dragons and hasbro has been generous with freebies, there's a school near us Max just discovered who run gaming sessions - I'm planning on getting in touch with them

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): Elva, they are very good about that. We pulled out Little Big Planet and are being met with "what's that"

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): I tried to write a grant to do LBP level designs

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): we wanted a cross-branch club ... seems our branch doesn't ahve the right demographic perhaps?

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): try partnering with an existing after school program if you aren't seeing the numbers - those kids can be a captive audience

Humanspy (Chris): Scratch was Mentioned, But their is another game creation tool

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): Humanspy is my friend Chris, who has taught Game Design via Simmons GSLIS with me :)

Humanspy (Chris): Kudo was used in Elementry Schools in Michgian to teach Story telling.

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): sounds interesting!

Humanspy (Chris): It also has low system requrements and be played on the Xbox game System or on a PC. Any other questions about it?

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): what kind of learning curve does it have?

Humanspy (Chris): For students who game its very short. Everything is visual and..it comes packaged with games that teach you how to use it. Its also completely free like Scratch.

Maxwelig: You've given us a lot to play with and think about , thanks.

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): definitely! and thank you both ...

Franticread (Ellen Forsyth): Please join with me in thanking Beth / Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway) for the great ideas from today.

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): thank you so much for the opportunity!

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): ...thanks again, Frantic, for hosting this

Franticread (Ellen Forsyth): And also thanks to Chris / Humanspy (Chris)

Elvabelle: Thanks Beth - very interesting. Now to get coucil to alloow us to unblock the sites

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway) thanks you.

Franticread (Ellen Forsyth): Big thanks to Liz /Heimal for the great promotion of #rugame in her latest blog post for Library Journal

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway) thanks Humanspy (Chris).

Franticread (Ellen Forsyth): next up 14 April 9.00am (Australian Eastern Daylight Time) we will hear from M. Brandon Robbins, a young adult librarian doing very interesting things with games in North Carolina. NOte: for North American participants this talk will take place 13 April

Hiemal (Liz Danforth): Brandon has done a LOT of guest posts for me at Library Journal. I think he'll be a fine speaker

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): fantastic - and I'll put some links and tools at http://infogdss.wordpress.com

Franticread (Ellen Forsyth): thanks so much to Beth and to Chris for the great ideas - and the evaluation. I am glad everyone enjoyed it - see you next time : )

Rannganathan (Beth Gallaway): take care, all, and Game On!