Interesting talk from the creators of SingPath – games to help people learn to code. Left me wanting to try the game! Some insights about women and what they find off-putting – nothing unexpected. Notes below:
Intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation: autonomy, mastery, purpose (Dan Pink’s book – Amazon).
Want to extrinsically motivate people without killing intrinsic motivation. This is really hard. Decided to focus on extrinsic.
Quests: “The Spy Who Coded Javascript” – it’s a first person coder.
Games are hard fun. They:
- Have clear goals.
- Require concentration.
- Give immediate feedback.
- Deep, effortless involvement.
- Uncertain outcome.
Hard to find balance – some people find it too easy, others too hard. Answer: adaptive difficulty (difficulty changes, depending on how you’re doing).
A setting easier than easy – drag and drop. This is not intimidating. Also allows for tablet based – an iPad app.
Individual learner – try to maximise classroom efficiency.
Tournaments – everyone in the room is solving the same thing, at the same time.
Idea: “Tournament based teaching”. First 5 minutes are close-book, after that open book. Peer based learning – first 10 finish, then go and help people who haven’t finished. There will always be some students who are very fast – these students then get to explain/mentor.
First pro tournament at Pycon APAC.
Collaborative learning – fun round, then prize round. No qualitative judging, the most efficient coding wins.
Team-based tournaments.
Pair-programming tournaments.
Contemplating: mixed doubles (one female, one male on the team) – encourage peer-based learning, diversity.
How do you balance carrot/stick with things that people are intrinsically motivated for?
Women less likely to participate in the competitive rounds – the fun round, yes, prize round no.