Human Migration Board Games

Linking with our migration theme, we have been looking to become 'learning leaders' by teaching others about what we have learned so far this term.

We are currently creating our own board games that teach players a little about how human migration is a response to challenges, risks and opportunities. 

If you have been following our Twitter you will have noticed some tweets about this project over the last couple of weeks. 

It began by us asking - 'What makes a good board game?'

We came up with our own criteria for board games:

1. Good length
2. Quality - Artwork and pieces
3. Challenging - But not too hard
4. Fair
5. FUN (not a 'bored' game!)

We started to design our own games. We found inspiration in the stories of human migration that we have investigated recently. Push and pull factors are used as the positive and negative effects on the players in our games, which are mostly about players trying to get themselves from one place to another.

Linking with our explanation writing focus, we have also been looking at instruction manuals for well-known board games, identifying common sections, and writing our own game instructions using appropriate vocabulary. These have been created in Google Docs and shared with Mr K for printing and laminating. 

Testing our games has proven to be so important, as others have helped us to identify flaws in our games. Most of us have found areas for improvement before we begin our final creations. 

This week we have begun on our final products. Still works in progress, but we are looking forward to inviting the rest of our senior syndicate to play our games and give us feedback. 

It is exciting to see so many board game themes arising from the literacy projects we have been involved in, from the story of Canterbury's First Four Ships, to tales of Polynesian discovery in the Pacific. The links we have made to our Geometry focus is also important, as many of the games involve the use of compass directions for navigation. This is a project that has allowed for a number of learning areas to be integrated. We are currently thinking about whether we should create commercials for our games on our iPads to 'pull in' prospective players from outside of our classroom...