Leah's blog

Quest to Learn's end of trimester Boss Levels, concluded on March 26, with the presentation of seven plays—written, performed, directed and designed by the schools sixth grade students. The performances were the culmination of two weeks of immersion into the art of theater and storytelling, in particular performance, acting and scriptwriting. The visual design and behind-the-scenes elements of theatrical productions were also explored and students worked in small groups to paint scenery and create of unique sound effects, costumes and a playbill for each play.

Days before the performance of the plays, just when they were in the throes of rehearsals and last minute script changes, the students were asked to stop and reflect on their roles and experiences. Some of the questions and issues they pondered, included, What did the production of a play entail? What was the significance of each area they had explored during the last week? Could the theater or the production of a play be described as a system? If so, how might you identify this system’s elements and their relationships?

For the past week the Institute of Play has been hard at work teaching and supporting the Quest to Learn "Boss Levels," the final form of assessment in the Quest to Learn school's trimester. The term boss level is derived from the video game world. It's used to describe the culminating stage (or level) in a video game when a player not only synthesizes and displays the skills they've built up throughout the game but also plumbs their knowledge bank to learn combine pre-existing ideas with new ones.

This Boss Level is the culmination of a trimester-long focus on the relationship between elements of a system and how change affects how systems interact. The unofficial tagline is "What Story Will you Tell?" and the student's are challenged to work in small groups to create, write, design, act and perform an original play. Although the goal of the project is to create and perform a play, the focus of the Boss Level is collaboration, process and working together.

The winter installment of Q2L’s afterschool program Mobo Studio has been in full-effect since early February. Administered and developed by the Institute of Play, Mobo Studio’s themed workshops or “pods” have been led by two new and talented teacher-mentors, Inti Einhorn and Rosanna Lopez. Mobo Studio’s project-based learning environment creates an active, studio-like atmosphere where kids are encouraged to problem solve, learn new things and integrate mobile technologies in authentic and creative ways.

This trimester Mobo Studio has two offerings—Frankentoy and Video U. In Frankentoy, students become mad scientists and learn about resourcing and re-using materials and how things work by deconstructing and reconstructing everything from plush toys to legos. Ripping, cutting, stuffing, and sewing, Frankentoy is a truly hands-on and process-oriented environment, where students are creating “truly absurd and wonderful plush beasts” which they hope to bring back to life using stop-motion animation. Right now the focus is on creation and documentation, as students make objects and then invent fantastical backstories which can be posted on Q2L’s social learning network Being Me.

The Institute of Play has recently returned from Diversifying Participation a Digital Media and Learning Conference in San Diego, a three-day forum for educators, researchers, designers, scholars and other thought-partners.

The conference provided a great forum to learn about new organizations and initiatives and to re-examine the ways that a range of stakeholders are harnessing everything from locative games to virtual worlds in thought-provoking ways. One example, the Birmingham, AL-based education design firm, g8four, whose Changelab summer program uses challenge-based and project-driven learning environments XO laptops and the Scratch animation platform to help kids work with local leaders to problem solve around issues in their local communities. Another example is STARTL, a start-up incubator and accelerator that connects designers of digital innovative learning tools and products with entrepreneurs, investors and foundations.