Wednesday October 16, 2024
Presented by David Gagnon

In the 1970s, Joan Cooney and others reimagined television as a tool for education and inclusion. Today, we have a similar opportunity with video games. While public media still revolves around broadcast models, we, as creators of interactive experiences, understand the power of games to inspire, affirm, and co-create with players. It’s time to build a new kind of public media—one that is free, inclusive, and interactive at its core.

David Gagnon is the Director of Field Day, a games studio and research laboratory in the Wisconsin Center for Education Research at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. Field Day’s games are played millions of times yearly, primarily in school contexts, and have won dozens of awards. Field Day’s research revolves around the use of game data to inform design, theory, teaching and learning at scale by teaming researchers and artists with computers.

Thursday October 17, 2024
Presented by Azadeh Jamalian and Jessica Mezei

Join us for an inspiring keynote that’s been six years in the making. In 2018, The GIANT Room began as a simple pop-up creative studio where kids could get messy, make things, and think big. Our mission was clear: take kids' ideas seriously and collaborate with them to create extraordinary projects alongside STEM professionals. Fast forward to today, and that vision has grown into a comprehensive, successful STEM curriculum, the GIANT Design Lab where we partner with industry leaders to co-design products, policies, and learning experiences for kids and with kids, and we’re building a new creative AI design and publishing app.

In this keynote, we’ll dive deep into the transformative power of co-design—how we work side-by-side with children to shape products, policies, and their own learning. You'll learn practical strategies for applying co-design principles to your work, no matter your field, and hear the hilarious, insightful stories of what happens when kids' imaginations run wild.

Come away inspired with actionable tactics for harnessing creativity and innovation, and discover how co-design can unlock fresh perspectives for you and your team. Whether you’re in education, design, tech, or any field that values creativity, this keynote will leave you thinking differently about the future.

Azadeh Jamalian. Phd in Cognitive Science in Education Teachers College, Columbia University, BAS in Systems Engineering

Azadeh Jamalian is founder and CEO of The GIANT Room co-design lab for families and schools. She is a TED speaker, former head of education strategy at littleBits, and co-founder of Tiggly. Jamalian has designed learning products and programs that millions of families have engaged with, and thousands of schools have implemented in their programs. Through her work at The GIANT Room, she has partnered with 150 schools, museums, libraries, and organizations such as Joan Ganz Cooney Center, LEGO Education, Scratch Foundation, Brainpop, and Lysol to provide community engagement, design, and learning programs. She has a PhD in cognitive studies in education from Teachers College, and has published on topics such as designing learning platforms for family engagement and emerging educational tech.

Jessica Mezei, PhD Science Education Teachers College Columbia University, BA Education, BS Biology

Jessica Mezei is a co-founder of The GIANT Room co-design lab for families and schools. With experience as a classroom science teacher, researcher, and parent, she has consistently centered play-based methodologies in the programs she designs and studies. GIANT Room has partnered with 150 schools, museums, libraries, and organizations such as Joan Ganz Cooney Center, LEGO Education, Scratch Foundation, Brainpop, and Lysol to provide community engagement, design, and learning programs. In addition to her work in education, Jessica has also helped early-stage tech start-ups connect educators with innovative, creative solutions to integrate play into their products and services. Through The GIANT Room, she continues to empower educators, caregivers, and communities to create environments where children can thrive and bring their imaginations to life. Jessica holds a PhD in Science Education from Columbia University.

Friday October 18, 2024
Presented Sabrina Culyba

When playing games, we take on a playful mindset that looks for meaning to emerge. When making games, we are constantly seeking to infuse this emergent meaning-making into our craft. With more people playing games and making games than ever before, we can turn this playful mindset outward to open up new design paths, insights, and connections that expand our communal exploration of human play.

Sabrina Culyba (she/her) is a Pittsburgh-based game designer and founder of Ludoliminal. Her professional work has spanned online games, VR, mobile apps, location-based entertainment, and board games across a variety of industries from entertainment to education. Her most recent game is the board game Diatoms, a game about making microscopic mosaics from algae. Sabrina is the author of The Transformational Framework. She serves on the Board for Global Game Jam and Broke the Game, and is an affiliate designer at Carnegie Mellon's Center for Transformational Play.

Presented by John Balash of the Center for Transformational Play at Carnegie Mellon University

During this play driven session developed at Carnegie Mellon University's Center for Transformational Play, participants will experience various LEGO based frameworks and methodologies designed to create deeper engagement while supporting social and emotional well being. The three pillars of the workshop are remixes of the Six Bricks activities, developed by the LEGO Foundation, LEGO Serious Play, designed by the LEGO Group, and the Brick-By-Brick program, by Play Included, an official partner of the LEGO Foundation. Beyond the workshop attendees, will be able to reference free resources and deploy some activities into their learning environment.

Presented by Dana Gold

Divisions abound in our world today - and creating empathy is on everyone’s radar. Broke the Game, both a board game and an app, creates and enhances empathy for individuals struggling to overcome poverty. Originally conceived to create empathy for unhoused individuals living in shelters, Broke the Game has expanded to include the challenges experienced by multiple segments of the US population caught in systems of poverty. Based on situations pulled from real-life, Broke’s game-play environment mimics the high stakes situations of financial precarity where the contraction of cognitive function occurs.

During this session, participants will play Broke the Game, be introduced to the research behind the impact it has on empathy creation, and be able to contribute their insights as Broke undertakes the process of validation as an evidence-based tool for empathy creation.

Dana Gold is a non-profit serial entrepreneur. Dana started her career in a food pantry and then went on to open halfway houses for men, women and children struggling to overcome homelessness. In 2007, during the height of the HIV/AIDS crisis in South Africa, Dana developed a video-mentoring program for teens living in child-headed households. She is currently the COO of a nonprofit that welcomes refugees, provides legal help to immigrants, lowers barriers for job seekers, and is a resource for food, counseling, and youth programs for 1000's of people every year. Dana is also the creator of Broke the Game, a board game that helps develop empathy for individuals struggling to overcome the poverty cycle.

Dana created Broke the Game out of the frustration that came from a realization that sharing stories and teaching classes about poverty were not enough to help people “get it”. After experiencing Broke the Game, players report a new and enduring empathy for individuals struggling with poverty., Players also reported that the game influenced their thoughts and actions months and even years following their first exposure to the game.

Broke the Game, now a nonprofit, is led by Dana and a very talented Board of Directors. Their goal is to have Broke available in classrooms and boardrooms, offices and libraries, and political backrooms across the country. Essentially, anywhere decisions are made, policies created, or awareness is needed to help the poor overcome poverty.

How do you create successful learning ecosystems? In this live-action role-playing game, you'll learn the five core skills to build a playful learning ecosystem in your own community. Or, come to see how live-action role-playing can be a transformational educational experience!