Philosophy, Current Status, Short and Long term Development Jacco Dieleman Willeke Wendrich.

Philosophy, Current Status, Short and Long term Development

Jacco Dieleman Willeke Wendrich

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Zahi Hawass (SCA, Cairo, Egypt)

David Jeffreys (University College London, UK)

Kasia Szpakowska (University of Wales, Swansea, UK)

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Original, USER-CREATED data:Primary excavation dataText editionsSearchable databasesAnd more??? Digital Media…

Number of Entries:

First phase (July 2008): 550 entries

Second phase (2010): 2000 entries

Third phase (2013): 4000 entries

Advantage over Printed Reference Works

Writing phase

Publication phase

Use phase

Update phase

Long term

Peer reviewAutomated editorial systemNo need to finish “A”before proceeding to “B”Quote as regular publication Searches made easyClickable linksMultimedia

Update what is neededVersion control

Digital PreservationHistory of Egyptological thought

Academic Editorial Board

Editors: Willeke WendrichJacco DielemanJohn BainesElizabeth Frood

Dorothea Arnold (Metropolitan Museum, New York)

Joris Borghouts (Leiden University, Netherlands)

Fayza Haikal (American University Cairo, Egypt)

Janet Johnson (Oriental Institute, Univ. Chicago)

Antonio Loprieno (Basel University, Switzerland)

Stephan Seidlmayer (Berlin University, Germany)

Alain Zivie (CNRS Egyptology, Paris, France)

Thanks to:

James Allen, Chris Eyre (endorsement IAE)David Silverman, Josef WegnerStephen Quirke, John GeeAnthony Spalinger, Willem Hovestreydt

National Endowment of the Humanities

Academic Technology Services (ATS)Center for Digital Humanities (CDH)UCLA Digital Humanities Incubator Group (UDHIG)Institute for Digital Research and Education (IDRE)Digital Library (DL)California Digital Library (CDL)International InstituteOffice of Instructional Development (OID)Office of the Vice Chancellor of Research

Department of NELCCotsen Institute of Archaeology

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Work of a group resulting in a theoreticalframe work (basic) or apractical function (applied)

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Part Two: Educational Games

Problems in creating a game about history:

• How do you create a game that teaches students a process, rather than a simple answer?

• Names and dates are essentially trivia, rote memorization. We need to come up with a model that illustrates historial processes, as well.

Educational Games

Problems in creating a game about history:• How do we create a game that is specific

enough that the information it teaches is more than just random trivia, but of enough general appeal that it is cost-effective?

• Games like Carmen San Diego essentially teach random trivia, being (arguably) too general; games like Oregon Trail are so specific as to be of very limited use, so there isn’t a huge market for them. Is there a middle ground, or another way around the problem?

Educational GamesProblems in creating a game about history:• How do we create a game in which the process of playing it actually

teaches/reinforces history, as opposed to emphasizing a separate set of skills?

• In order to win at Math Blasters, you have to solve a math problem in your head: that IS the game mechanic, and it teaches math by forcing the student to do it. Carmen San Diego teaches geography by forcing students to find places on maps/look up info in encyclopedias, etc.: learning social studies IS the game mechanic.

• 3D simulations of ancient history usually DON’T teach history via the game mechanics. Mace Mentch (http://blog.case.edu/mwm13/) made the point in Cleveland, and I paraphrase: “All I’ve learned from 1st-person shooters is how to strafe and to get the shotgun as early as possible.” How does moving a character around, even in an incredibly detailed simulation of the ancient world, teach/reinforce history? The student learns the most by DOING, so the game must DO history.

A Possible Solution?• How about a game that models the process of historical research,

specifically archaeology? The students’ job, like the archaeologists, is to use the clues in the soil and good archaeological theory to learn as much as possible about the history of the archaeological site.

• The game rewards players who look for context (that is, excavating horizontally in addition to vertically, as archaeologists do) by increasing the number of “points” that they receive for any given area when the entire horizontal area, as opposed to only part of it, is exposed.

• As a “level” in the site is cleared, the students see a short summary, perhaps an animated video, illustrating that phase in the site’s history. When they complete the entire site, they can see an entire summary (again, both text and an animated video) for the site. In this way, they learn about the process of history in the same way that professional archaeologists do: By investigation and analysis.

A Possible Solution?

• By keeping the technology simple (tile-based), it will be possible to create a simple level-editor that can be used to create new content at a very low “cost.”

• Each level can be designed around a real archaeological site and can focus on one particular historical process that the student is learning about in class.

• The game doesn’t replace the teacher, it reinforces the material being gathered from oral (teacher) and visual (textbook) sources, and is potentially more appealing to certain learners.

A Possible Solution?• The game rewards players who take their time and think about their

next move; instead of having a timer, they instead have a limited number of moves.

• Different versions can include a classroom version with an unlimited number of moves but a “par” for the level, so that students can explore particular processes at the teacher’s direction; a “campaign”-style game for private play, which follows the story of a character or characters much like the learners as they travel from archaeological site to archaeological site while investigating a larger mystery; a collaborative mode in which players need the data gathered at OTHER archaeological sites in order to complete their own timelines, again just like real archaeologists.

• The level editor allows developers to add jpeg images and audio to any in-game object/area, so that functioning archaeological digs can model all or part of their site, using real data, and make those levels available via the internet for students to explore.

A Possible Solution?• http://www.humnet.ucla.edu/itc/johnitc/excavation/Game_Play.html• http://www.humnet.ucla.edu/itc/johnitc/excavation/Game_Editor.html• Please remember, this is only a beta. Future plans include

exchanging the timer function for a limited number of moves, as described previously, developing a much simpler set of instructions, activating the ability to link jpegs to in-game objects, etc. The last three slides describe the total vision, while this is only part-way there.

• Feel free to show this beta to your colleagues, and to email me with questions at [email protected]. I will be pursuing this project in the coming months, including looking for funding to create a completed release version, so any comments, criticism or suggestions that will help create a stronger, more useful tool will be much appreciated.