I will be speaking at one of the last Idea Labs at the ASAE Technology Conference next Friday, February 12th at 3:30PM. I like to think that I was placed in this “closing” position because conference organizers felt that the topic of “Using eLearning Games to Recruit, Engage, and Educate Members” would keep attendees energized until the very end of the conference. I plan not to disappoint! It has already drawn more interest from the press than my other session on the Moodle learning management system.
Associations Now! magazine invited me to author an article on“Five Ways Associations Can Use Online Games”. Kurt Squire’s class at the University of Wisconsin inspired me to look into the power of online games. That was back in 2004 when he was a new professor just returning from a stint with Henry Jenkins at MIT. Their Microsoft funded GamesToTeach project was an early force in changing people’s opinions on video games. I learned at the Games, Learning, and Society program at the UW-Madison that video games have a lot to teach educators and marketers. The way people learn from games, what game mechanics make online games addictive, and how to successfully utilize games to build community and optimize web traffic are important topics for discussion.
Join me in Washington DC for a lively dialogue on how to effectively use online games to build our communities of practice, or promote our products and services.!