Technology Tip of the Week - December 5, 2005

Make Reviewing Fun!

If you have basic PowerPoint skills you can take advantage of some PowerPoint game templates to make your exam review interactive and engaging. A good template to start with is the Challenge game template (modeled after the Jeopardy game). The template has the game board all set up - all you have to do is type in your customized categories, questions and answers. You can create a game in under a half hour! To use the template:

Click on the Challenge game template link at http://it.ccri.edu/Faculty/volk_challenge.ppt and choose Save and then Open

Once the game opens in PowerPoint the only changes to make to Slide 1 are the category labels. Drag over the text for Category A so that it is highlighted and then type in your unique category label. Repeat for all the Category labels in the top row. Leave the rest of the slide alone as it contains all the links that are needed for the game.

On Slide 2, drag over the filler text that says Category A - Question 100 so that it is highlighted and then type in your first question as replacement text

One Slide 3 drag your cursor over the filler text that says Category A - Answer 100 so that it is highlighted and then type in your replacement text. (Remember to put your answer in the form of a question, e.g. Who is Abraham Lincoln?).

Repeat these steps for all the question and answer slides. Usually the questions are increasingly more difficult as the point value increases.

Choose Save As and rename the file to match the topic you've built the game around. This way you don't overwrite the original template and can re-use it whenever you wish to create new games.

This game comes with two music files that are already linked to the slides. If you'd like to use these files, click on the links, choose Save and make sure you save them to the same location as your game so that the links work. These are both .wav files and you will need Windows Media Player in order for the files to play.

Note: Remember that if you copy your game to a floppy, zip disk, CD or flash drive, you must also copy all the music files to the same location.

Download the Jeopardy theme music at: http://it.ccri.edu/Faculty/Jeopardy.wav

Download the Ding! sound at: http://it.ccri.edu/Faculty/DING.WAV

For more fun reviewing strategies see: http://it.ccri.edu/Faculty/review_strategies.shtml

Articles of the Week

"Marc Prensky is an internationally acclaimed speaker, writer, consultant, and designer in the critical areas of education and learning. He is the author of Digital Game-Based Learning (McGraw-Hill, 2001), the founder and CEO of Games2train (whose clients include IBM, Nokia, Pfizer, and the US Department of Defense).

Marc has created over 50 software games for learning, including the world's first fast-action videogame-based training tools and world-wide, multi-player, multi-team on-line competitions. He has also taught at all levels. Marc has been featured in articles in The NY Times and The Wall Street Journal, has appeared on CNN, MSNBC, PBS, and the BBC, and was named as a top 10 "visionary" by Training magazine. He holds graduate degrees from Yale (Teaching) and Harvard (MBA)." (Taken from his website at http://www.marcprensky.com).

Most of Marc's writings are on his website at: http://www.marcprensky.com/writing. Two short articles may be particularly interesting to you this week as we look at adding reviewing games to your teaching repertoire.

Why Games Engage Us by Marc Prensky at: http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Why%20Games%20Engage%20Us.pdf

Types of Learning and Possible Game Styles by Marc Prensky at: http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Types%20of%20Learning%20and%20Possible%20Game%20Styles.pdf

What do you think about using games in the classroom - fluff or substance? Can you share your experiences with different games in the classroom? Log in to the Teaching Forum and add your thoughts to the message board.

These tips are provided by the Department of Information Technology instructional support team. If you have any questions on these tips, or wish to offer your own, please feel free to contact Linda Beith at lbeith@ccri.edu. View an archive of past technology tips.