We were lucky that a parent of a child in our class works with Digital School House and they let us know about the event. There were spaces available and the children were really enthusiastic and keen to go. It would be great to let more schools know about the event – I am sure they would find it very worthwhile.
This event was especially engaging as the children worked in their co-operative learning groups, designing games and presentations for Ninja Kiwi (a local games developer?). They created their own amazing and unique games that they then pitched Ninja Kiwi staff like in Dragon’s Den. This allowed them to pull together an array of skills and during this time we looked into Dundee and its gaming history.
On the day, children and young people were excited to arrive at the University where they received tote bags on arrivals with some ‘merch’. They really enjoyed the session with Olive, about her game Private Joke, and enjoyed how much creativity and fun it involved. Lunches were a big hit as well, and the gaming exhibit at the end where they got to play games and try things out. They were big fans of the design a character, with Ninja Kiwi, and after this I heard two boys discussing coming to Abertay to study and design a game together.
“The monkey bit was really fun and creative as you could do anything; the exhibit at the games were really fun. I liked the whole day as it was really interactive and wasn’t just sitting around for like 25 minutes.” Hamish M, 10 years old.
“I really liked it because I liked the workshops and the VR headset. My The part I really liked was playing on the Nintendo Switch; the commentating workshop was very interesting because I liked the instructor because he told us all sorts of information.” Akshara, 10 years old.
As a teacher, i really liked the range of speakers and activities for the children to engage with. I thought the sessions were a good length and covered a lot of different aspects of learning. The games were a good opportunity to play. My favourite was the Private Joke session as it was the most transferable and the games commentary workshop was also really engaging.
We had a great time and loved being a part of the day, especially it being the first in Scotland. The children felt really inspired afterwards and comments about not knowing how many skills were needed in gaming, some children who are really creative and love drawing realising there were career opportunities, children who love playing games, children who love maths and numbers and then the ones who love reading, they all came away talking about how what they liked learning about and how there were pathways in gaming and computing industries.
