The Complete Guide to Simulations and Serious Games (eBook)

Clark Aldrich, an international consultant, workshop leader, and popular conference speaker, is an award- and patent-winning designer of educational simulations including SimuLearn's Virtual Leader global product line. He works with corporate, academic, entertainment, and military organizations, and is the author of two award-winning books, Simulations and the Future of Learning and Learning by Doing (both from Pfeiffer). He is also a columnist and analyst in the overlap of IT and HR and founder of, and former director of research for, Gartner's e-learning coverage.

Foreword (Jeff Sandefer).

Preface: The Elements of Interactivity.

Introduction: Capturing the Wisdom That Has Fallen through theCracks of Gutenberg and Google.

The Most Important Skills.

The Campfire and the Veld.

How to Use This Book.

The Babel Problem--"Serious Games" or"Educational Simulations".

A New Science.

PART ONE Genres: Savior or Saboteur for Literacy 2.0?

1 Sims--The New Media of "Learning to Do" NotJust "Learning to Know".

2 Immersive Learning Simulation: Because You Can't Learnto Ride a Bicycle from a Book.

3 Computer Games.

4 Traditional Education.

PART TWO Simulation Elements--Actions and Results:Framing The Missing Essence Of Research And Analysis.

5 Basic Actions.

6 Middle Skills--Design Patterns for More ComplicatedActions.

7 Desired Results.

PART THREE Simulation Elements of Systems: Connecting Actionsand Results.

8 Maps: The Context for Life.

Systems That Act as Triggers.

9 Units: How CEOs, Presidents, and Hostile Aliens View Life onEarth.

10 Artificial Intelligence Player-Agent: More Patient Than RealPeople.

11 State-Based Systems and Models: A Shortcut toSimulations.

12 Pure Mathematical System: The Real Stuff.

13 Work Process.

14 Big Skills: The Most Important Twenty-First-CenturySkills.

PART FOUR Building Interactive Environments.

15 Linear Content.

16 Game Elements: A Spoonful of Sugar If You Can AvoidHypoglycemic Shock.

17 Pedagogical Elements: Learn Faster and Better.

18 Tasks and Levels.

19 Display.

20 Community.

21 Basic Inputs.

PART FIVE Formal Learning Program.

22 Learning Goals.

23 Program Goals.

24 Target Audiences and Corresponding Learning and ProgramGoals.

Target Audience

25 When to Use Sims--Meeting Both Learning and ProgramGoals.

26 Educational Simulation Creation and Milestones Part 1: AnOverview of Key Steps.

27 Educational Simulation Creation and Milestones Part 2:Calibrating Skill Cones and Designing the Different Layers ofFeedback.

28 The Necessary Student Experience of Frustration andResolution.

29 Evaluation Strategies and the Analysis of Learning.

30 Conclusion: Banishing Today's Classrooms, Curricula,Term Papers, Training Programs, Business Plans, and Linear Analysisto the Intellectual Slums and Backwaters to Which They So RichlyBelong.

Appendix: Simulation Case Studies: Do Sims Work Better ThanTraditional Instruction?

About the Author.

Index.