Investigations into play and the use of games (both digital and non-digital means) as an instrument for facilitating creative and active learning include analysing the principle and techniques of what it is that makes game-play so engaging, decoding the elements (mechanics, dynamics and aesthetics) that make them work and then applying these to the design of creative and engaging learning activities.

The Disruptive Media Learning Lab has found there to be an appetite now to follow this trend in teaching and learning and a need for learners to be co-creators of resources and contents, which has seen playful and gameful approaches being experimented at Coventry University; initiatives ranging from non-digital playful approaches to highly sophisticated digital games and VR/AR technologies.

“It is in playing, and only in playing, that the individual child or adult is able to be creative and to use the whole personality, and it is only in being creative that the individual discovers the self.“

 D.W. Winnicott, British paediatrician, 1896-1971

The Playful and Gameful strand of innovation thus aims to explore new learning cultures and impact around the use of gameplay for learning and the process of game creation with an emphasis on meaningful/ purposeful learning experience and outcomes.

We’re proud to say that our playful and gameful strand is part sponsored by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) and the NEWTON UK-SEA (AHRC + MoHE) fund .