Siobhan McDonnell: Convener of an online game that creates transformation
What kind of game is so immersive that it’s transformative for postgraduate students already experienced in that field?
That’s a question our presenters want to answer.
We’re delighted to announce that our second featured presenter for the Blended Learning Lunch Vox is not one but three people in an academic-student collaboration. Associate Professor Siobhan McDonnell from the Crawford School of Public Policy will be joined by past students Ta’hirih Hokafonu and Rachel Dunstone. Ta’hirih is a Senior Development Program Coordinator for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs NZ in Tonga, and Rachel is the Director of the National Disaster Risk Profile at the National Emergency Management Agency in Canberra.
Siobhan will describe her innovative approach to blended learning: a highly immersive, online game ‘Cyclone’, and its transformative impact on students and facilitators alike. Amazingly, the game is relatively low tech, using only Teams and readily-available Learning Management System (LMS) features.
It’s set in an island across 3–4 villages, where students are allocated to participate as a villager or a member of one of several fictional NGOs. This approach aims to give the students a more direct experience of the meaning and implications of inclusive disaster planning.
[…] you’re taking students out of the classroom and you’re creating a virtual world around them, where they can start to engage in what are very complex policy-making dynamics. It’s one thing to teach that, it’s another thing to try and play that out.
Siobhan McDonnell
Siobhan has been deeply involved in disaster resilience, management and recovery at a practical and policy level. ‘Cyclone’, a dynamic example of blended learning, is based on Siobhan’s lived experience working on the ground in Vanuatu after two cyclones hit almost simultaneously. She draws on the vast knowledge she has accrued by living, working and writing in this space. The post-graduate course, Disaster Risk Reduction and Management, attracts students who are already highly experienced professionals in disaster or international humanitarian fields, such as Ta’hirih and Rachel.
A house in Vanuatu after a cyclone. Image credit: Silke von Brockhausen, United Nations Development Programme CC BY-NC-ND
Do you think the creation of a game is too big to translate into your own teaching practice? Not necessarily. A simpler version created for another course has been very successful and is now long-running.
Cyclone was inspired by a game built for a Land Rights and Resource Development course by colleagues Sango Mahanty and Colin Filer. Evidence suggests this game facilitates deep learning and impactful collaborative experiences (Beckman & Mahanty, 2016).
We invite you to join us and be inspired to create transformation in your own course.
References
Beckmann, E. A., & Mahanty, S. (2016). The evolution and evaluation of an online role play through design-based research. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 32(5), 35-47. http://dx.doi.org/10.14742/ajet.1957
