A Noisy, Fun Classroom Full of Game Designers
The video shows a glimpse of the final results. The illustrations are lovely and funny, and the levels are really interesting.
At the end of February, before COVID became a topic, three friends and I ran a game design workshop with a school class. We prepared a Unity project for the students to work on in groups and create a small game about the fall of the Berlin Wall.
My favourite moment: One boy on my team had drawn two frames for the main character’s walk cycle, then lost interest. I had to persuade him to continue (or, really, just say: “Finish this now!”*). He reluctantly kept drawing. After the children had left, we cut out the images and added them to Unity as an animation. The next day, the students got to see their own characters walk.
The boy’s reaction: “Whoa, coool, it actually walks?!?!”
That made me so happy!
What I learned from the workshop: No matter how hard you try, you can’t prepare for everything—especially when you’re working with children!
I think we created some really funny and interesting results, especially considering we only had two days. Next time, we’ll bring more animation examples or try a workshop without teams, using activity stations instead.
My ambition to plan the perfect workshop without any real experience was simply unrealistic. Any teacher or educator would have laughed at the idea.
A whole class will turn any plan on its head, so you have to be very flexible.
All in all, it was incredibly exhausting, but also very, very rewarding. The results are great, we learned so much, and I’d love to do it again. It was fun!
Here I am, looking a little overwhelmed, standing among my team as they build their levels in Unity.
*I’m not very good at bossing people around (my family would disagree), but it was often necessary and worked well. The teacher, Ms Lerch, struck a great balance between “What are you doing?! Get on with what you’re supposed to be doing!” and encouragement like “Look at that. It’s already great—keep going!”
I found it difficult to be so firm, because in this very new situation I felt like a child myself, not like the adult in the room giving instructions. Next time will be different—just you wait! ;)
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