Design Games to Learn: A New Approach to Playful Learning Through Digital Games

In this paper we argue that there is a need for digital games that could be easy to alter by young learners. Unfortunately it was found that digital games do not enable children to express their creativity at full, in contrast with low-fidelity prototypes and non-digital toys (such as card or table top games). Therefore, we propose here a middle ground between digital and traditional table top games, so to grant children more freedom to express themselves, articulate their understanding and difficulties individually or socially; this approach is an alternative to the current trend of associating programming with digital creativity. In our preliminary study we transposed a digital game into a card game and observed students while shifting between playing and design thinking. Results from this study suggest that the notion of altering a digital game through a card-based transposition of the same game, could be used to create a new model for reprogramming existing games. The next step is to involve primary schools in more complete evaluations of our new game development approach.