Move, interact, learn, eat – A toolbox for educational location-based games

Abstract

Educational location-based games provide a link between content and its real-life relevance in a physical environment. Location-based activities for authentic learning provide multiple opportunities, but educators still perceive technological and organisational barriers. There is a need for easy-to-use tools to facilitate the design of playful location-based mobile learning activities that can be integrated into larger curriculums. In this project a transdisciplinary team (educational experts in outdoor education, in nutrition and consumer education, computer scientists) co-created an online authoring system for location-based games, the MILE.designer. This authoring system provides several formats of tasks that can easily be adapted and located intuitively using a simple map interface. Several tasks can be combined into an educational geogame to be provided for a native smartphone app, the MILE.explorer. The theoretical background and the transdisciplinary development process are described, formative and summative evaluation results based on participatory observation and on focus group discussions are presented and further implications discussed.