Plague+Unit



This group of teachers and researchers is being formed to support implementation of the Quest Atlantis Plague Unit (Ingolstadt). It is hoped that by forming a small community we will be able to share stories of our implementation, talk about the impacts of our diverse contexts and strengthen our understanding of the value of learning in virtual worlds.

Toward better understanding this international research and design project assembles, as a sub-community, to implement a common QA unit (Plague Unit) over the second half of the 2009 or first half of 2010 calendar year. The research data will be collected as teachers are able to program the Plague unit within their school curriculum. Beyond Plague, we will ask teachers more generally how they have used QA in their classrooms, focusing on common and different classroom profiles. The goal here is for us to better understand the challenges and opportunities of scaling a game-based curriculum like Quest Atlantis. Collaborating with a particular group of 10-20 teachers, we will investigate the following core project research questions: The research aims to exemplify the type of community support that can be established through a shared teaching experience and to use ethnographic and auto-ethnographic methods to research the learning experience of teachers and students. Teachers who commit to teaching the Plague Unit will be assembled as a virtual sub-community of QA teacher community able to meet and, with the guidance of the researchers Bron Stuckey and Sasha Barab, support each other through the stages of implementation. //Howard Rheingold’s Social Media Classroom// will be used for the teachers to share, journal and report progress of their implementation. Additionally teachers will use social media (flickr, twitter, blogs, tags) to share progress and issues with the broader QA community of teachers. Bron Stuckey (bestucke@indiana.edu) and Sasha Barab (sbarab@indiana.edu )
 * //What are the challenges and opportunities in scaling a game-based learning environment?//
 * //How do diverse students and teachers within and from different countries actualize the environment differently?//
 * //How do the learning opportunities and meaning making practices look different in this environment than in other curricular environments in these schools?//

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 * Plague Unit Research Group Community Space**

Already members are:
 * Angela Cooke (Australia)
 * Bron Stuckey (Australia)
 * Cheryl Hill (Australia, NSW)
 * Kristin Bedell (USA, North Carolina)
 * Liesl Loudermilk (USA, Indiana)
 * Linda Hoffman (USA, Texas)
 * Lucy Taylor (UK)
 * Lynley Spanhake (New Zealand)
 * Michael Ma Hongliang (Xi'an, China)
 * Scott Merrick (USA, Tennessee)
 * Terry Smith (USA, California)
 * Donping Zheng (China & Hawaii)

If you are entertaining the idea of implementing this unit then come join us, old hands and new to share our stories. Please add your name to the list if you would like to join us and be given an account the the //Social Media Classroom// space//.//


 * About the Plague Unit itself**

The Plague Unit, inspired by Mary Shelley’s //Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus, //asks students to engage issues such as medical ethics and contemplate concepts such as the ends justifying the means and the nature of human existence as they experience a town affected by a disastrous plague. Questers come to Ingolstadt as investigative reporters and learn that the town is not only suffering from the terrible effects of the plague but is divided over an issue of medical ethics. The doctor working so hard to find the cure has been using methods that may be unethical or immoral in his research. Questers are soon drawn into this conflict when they are asked to investigate the problem and write a persuasive article for the local paper. Students learn the techniques of persuasive writing and how to construct a 5-paragraph essay during their explorations, and those skills will be put to the test when the fates of the doctor and his creation depend on their decision.