Running Head: GAME DESIGN DOCUMENT

Cameron Ware and Mickey Jancewski

ISTC 729-Spring 2018

Game Design Document, Dr. Q. Li

Title of the game: Know Me - A to Z

- Mickey Jancewski, [email protected]

- Cameron Ware, [email protected]

Design Rationale

Developing strong reading skills at a young age is critical to reading material throughout life.

Phonemic awareness (PA) is one of the five sub-processes of reading and assists in phonics,

reading and spelling (Nathan, 2007). Students who do not develop this skill are at a higher risk

for having difficulties in learning to read. According to WETA Public Broadcasting (2018),

identifying letters is a strong predictor of later reading success. Providing a game to help

practice this foundational skill will help strengthen reading skills.

Goals

Project Goal: The goal of this game is to help students become proficient in use of phonemics.

Educational Goals include:

Standards from the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE)

Standard 1.0 General Reading Processes for Pre-K

Topic: A. Phonemic Awareness --Students will master the ability to hear, identify, and

manipulate individual sounds in spoken words by the end of grade one.

Indicator ·1. Discriminate sounds and words

Objectives (from MSDE)

a. Tell whether sounds are same or different

b. Recognize that letters represent sounds

c. Identify and repeat initial sounds in words

d. Classify words by initial sounds

SMART Objectives:

 By the end of the gaming session, when shown a series of objects, the student will

be able to correctly identify the first letter of the words at least 75% of the time.

 By the end of the gaming session, when shown a letter, the student will be able to

correctly identify the item(s) that begin with that letter at least 75% of the time.

 By the end of the gaming session, when shown a group of three or four items, the

student will be able to select the one item that has a different first letter at least

65% of the time.

Audience

Target Learners: Students for this game will be Pre-K students throughout

Maryland. Maryland students are diverse in ability, economics, race/ethnicity, and

environmental settings where they live. The game is designed to align with Reading curriculum

for Pre-K indicators listed above. While designed specifically for this age group/indicators, older

students with learning difficulties, or people learning English as a second language may find it

helpful as well.

Context of Use and Scope

The educational purpose of this game is to re-enforce phonemics that have been taught

in the classroom. It is not designed to take the place of that instruction. This game is designed
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to be used for individualized practice in the class/school setting, at home, or on portable

devices. In a classroom setting, students would need to have devices and earphones/earbuds

so their individualized work does not disrupt other students. If played at home or on portable

devices or through apps, the students would need a device. If desired, they also may need

earbuds at home as well.

The specific content in this game is phonemics. It will include letters and

pictures/graphics of items (nouns) so that students can identify first letters of words or the

pictures provided in the game. This is the only content that will appear in this game.

This game can be played for as little as a few minutes or for as long as the student

maintains interest. Most children would not maintain interest beyond ten minutes. However,

there is no set amount of time a student must play to be successful. The sole content in this

game is phonemics. Students will need to identify first letters of items/words, identify words

that begin with a specific letter, and/or identify one word from several options that has a

different first letter.

Assessment of learning will occur throughout the game. As students correctly identify

the beginning sounds of words they will receive positive feedback. Their answers and score can

be maintained to determine how well they are learning the material. The summary of their

activity and their scores can be shared with the teacher only. The assessment data gathered by

the game could indicate any weaknesses in their learning so those areas could be re-taught or

re-enforced in the classroom setting. For example, if a child were having difficulty

differentiating words that begin with b or d, the data would be gathered on the child and the

teacher could then use the data to provide individualized instruction on those letters.
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Design Details:

Overview:

As this game is targeted for a younger audience the look and feel of the game would be

more cartoonish rather than realistic. The whole idea being to engage the player and to not

only maintain their interest for a long as possible but make it so they want to come back and

play again.

There would be assistive options built in as appropriate to further support a player. An

example might be if a word is presented and the player has a visual impairment they could have

the game say the word aloud and the player could respond with their answer.

Game Play:

When a player starts the game they are directed to the opening screen. On this screen

the player can select which game option they want to play. Once a player selects which game

they want to play the next screen will introduce the game and provide any directions for

playing that game. This information and directions would be read aloud as well as displayed as

text on the screen. After selecting a continue function the player would then be presented with

their first question (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Example question

If the question is answered correctly the player would get positive feedback with a sound

effect and be given the option to move onto the next question (Figure 2).

Figure 2: A correct answer screen

If the question is answered incorrectly the player would be informed they selected an incorrect

answer but would be given the option to go back and try again (Figure 3).

Figure 3: An incorrect answer screen

There will be no limit to the number of times the player can go back and try again as the

intention is to reinforce the lesson(s) already presented in the traditional classroom

environment.

The questions the player would be presented would come from a question bank and be

randomly selected to prevent having the same questions in the same order if the player plays

the game multiple times. After the series of questions for the selected game is complete the

player would reach a game completion screen (Figure 4). On the screen the player would have

the option of returning to the first screen thus allowing them to select a different game. If the

player did not want to continue playing the player would just have to exit the game.
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Figure 4: A game completion screen. This screen is missing the button to return to the main
page to continue playing a different game.

Figure 5 (below) shows the general flow of the game. The blue, red and yellow arrows

depict a different game selection. The purple and orange arrows indicate answer selection. On

each screen there would be a button to return to the game selection screen
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Figure 5: General game flow.

Game rules:

As this game it targeted at a younger population there are no specific rules in this game.

Players will not see how many questions they have gotten correct or incorrect as not to

discourage anyone. Children will choose which of three options they would like to engage.

They can stay in one area or switch among the three. The three options are:

 Option one - show the letters, then show pictures and they have to click on the

pictures that begin with that letter.

 Option two - show them a picture and they must choose which letter is the

beginning letter.

 Option three - they are shown four items, they choose the one that doesn’t belong -

that is the one that starts with a different letter.

When an answer is correct, they will receive positive audio and visual feedback. If an

answer is incorrect there will be no audio feedback and the only visual feedback will be letting

them know it was not a correct selection and encouraging them to go back and try again.

Technical elements:

Initially a publicly available online programming tool called Scratch is being utilized to

build a basic version of the game. This version is meant to be a prototype with a more

substantial version being built following initial market testing. A rapid prototype development

process is being used for the building of the prototype. The Scratch programming tool allows us

to build a limitedly functional version of the game with relative ease and quickness. This will

allow us to commence with market research that much sooner and gain valuable insight about

the game.

If, following completion of market testing, it is determined to move forward with further

game development first a computer based version of the game would be built with the

expectation of utilizing a common media player such as Flash as the game presentation

medium. An alternative to Flash could be to develop the game in a web based format such as

Java or HTML. This determination will be made following the completion of the initial market

research and testing phase.

Following the development of the computer or web-based version the anticipation is to

then develop a mobile application version which supports both the Android and iOS mobile

operating systems. The thought is there will be a greater desire to have the game available on a

mobile platform which would allow the user access virtually anytime, anywhere.
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References

MSDE (2007). State curriculum: Reading grade PK. Retrieved on March 31, 2018 from

http://mdk12.msde.maryland.gov/assessments/vsc/reading/bygrade/gradepk.html

Nathan, R (2003). Research best practices used in teaching of Reading: A story from the

trenches. California English 8 (3) 7-13. Retrieved from http://proxy-

tu.researchport.umd.edu/login?ins=tu&url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?dir

ect=true&db=edo&AN=31806786&site=eds-live&scope=site

Nicolau, C.C., Gomes, A.L. & Navas, P. (2015). Assessment of skills that predict reading success

in 1st and 2nd grade children of elementary school. Revista CEFAC-Speech, Language,

Hearing Sciences and Education Journal 17 (3) 917-26. Retrieved from http://proxy-

tu.researchport.umd.edu/login?ins=tu&url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?dir

ect=true&db=a9h&AN=108396257&site=eds-live&scope=site

WETA Public Broadcasting (2018). Alphabet matching. Retrieved from

http://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/alphabet_matching