G.A.M.E. – The last one in Catania. The #gameducation closed the circle!

The last training activity of the G.A.M.E. project took place from 17 to 21 May in Catania, Italy. Participants from all the four partners countries – Italy, Spain, Turkey, and the Czech Republic – came to Catania to finalise the project path to teach how to design GAMIFICATION strategies in school activities and environment. The group was composed about 20 teachers and NGO members and 40 students – from CEIPES Rosalia Norrito, Domenica Profita, Leonardo Alagna and Flavio Bonanno. The week of activities was divided in steps:

• 1st day – Oscar and Melissa from the CPR of Gijon gave directions to teachers and students to play games keeping to specific rules while enjoying the activity. After lunch, an epic deed to get to the Benedictine Monastery, the site of the humanistic faculty of the University of Catania.
• 2nd day – For the second session of Gamification, teachers and students took part in different team games related to different subjects (ex. History). All the students belonged to different guilds set up by the trainers and, once they won with the first team, they had to move around to other teams. After lunch, a suggestive visit to the most astounding European Volcano, Mt. Etna, which put on quite a show.
• 3rd and 4th day – Oscar and Melissa held the third session on storytelling, inspired by booklets written by Ann Payne. The game continued with the guilds division system, and the given pre-sets to create the stories had the peculiar aspects of holding optionality – you could choose one of two ways to continue each step of the story, therefore the results were not previously decided. Once the stories were written, guilds developed the visualisation in the IT Lab, adding images and videos to make them more exciting. The stories will finally be published on the ARXANIA platform at the end of the project.
• 5th day – On the 21st, the moving final ceremony has been held, with final certification to all participants. As they say, leaving is the worst part.

Lastly, all the participants were enthusiastic about the activities and the relationships established with the partners. The combination of educational and gamificafied activities with cultural trips enhanced the experience giving a unique trait of discovery. Stay tuned on Facebook, Twitter and the project website.