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In my Technology in Education class, we explore the future of technology and the future impact of technologies in the pipeline on classrooms. My class develops a card game each semester that explores the concept. They come up with the directions, use of cards, and design.

On September 8, I conducted the first of a two-part series on card games in the classroom for our monthly Serious Games Meetup. The first session focused on looking at different card games developed for critical thinking. This post details the games and concepts explored and lists the resources.

Colleges Against Insanity

Those of us who attended the 2017 WPCampus conference this Summer at Canisius received a card deck called Colleges Against Insanity, modeled after the famous, yet horrific, Cards Against Humanity card game. The deck explores the many possible reasons for the odd daily events that occur on colleges campuses. The deck gives us a way to laugh at ourselves and know we are not alone.

After playing a few turns of the deck, we examined some of its features. The deck only uses two colors, orange and white. It is modeled after another card deck. It uses a clear theme of college life. It has three types of cards, two direction cards, prompt cards, and possible answer cards. The deck allows for 2-6 players.

STEEP Cards

 

 

 

 

 

 

STEEP cards can be used for external analysis of discussion topics. This pack of cards contains 125 macro forces classified into the STEEP categories (social, technological, economic, environmental and political). STEEP cards can be used in workshops, trainings and classes to create awareness about past, current and future changes; stress test a business model; determine key-uncertainties to create future scenarios (scenario planning); create a SWOT analysis; create a system diagram; scenario planning; think about systems and how external developments connect to each other; or tell a story. Such cards are used to discover all of the points of impact and impacting factors in a system. They are also used to help predict possible futures.

After playing a few turns of the deck, we examined some of its features. The deck uses five colors to categorize the STEEP cards: orange, red, blue, green, and yellow. It has four types of cards: legend, perspectives of change, workshop ideas, and external factors cards. The deck allows for 2-6 players and includes 4 languages.

ForesightNZ

The original ForesightNZ cards were developed by participants of the 2016 ForesightNZ workshop in Wellington, New Zealand. Participants invented three games (use of the cards) for players to develop and strengthen their futures thinking skills: scenario-building, problem-solving, creative thinking, and dealing with uncertainty.

After playing a few turns of the deck, we examined some of its features. The deck uses three colors: teal, black and white. It has four types of cards: capital cards, event cards, joker cards, and trend cards. It also comes with a foldout directions sheet.

Impact

Impact is a foresight game designed to help people imagine and think critically about the future. Players take on the roles of distinct characters, each with their own “Job from the Future” and unique set of preferred future conditions. They compete to create a world where their future job is relevant and secure.

After playing a few turns, we examined some of the game’s features. The deck uses five colors: white, black, blue, yellow, and pink. It has three types of cards: “job from the future” role cards, impact cards, and disruption cards. It also comes with domain tiles that act as the game board, influence cubs, and protect tokens.

The second session in the card games for the classroom series will take place October 13 at 11am. Location TBA. In this session, we will take a look at gamification, game elements, and designing a card game for your classroom.