One way we know we are on the right track.

People are asking for epistemic games.

We hope this website provides a space where people who are interested in discussing new ways to think about education (and especially those who are interested in new technologies, games, and learning) can read and talk about some of the latest ideas about how to make education relevant to our evolving world. We decided on building the website in a blog format to encourage this kind of exchange. One of the things we constantly hear in comments (like here) and links (and here) to this website are queries about how to download, purchase, or test epistemic games. The interest is gratifying, and I wanted to take a moment to thank all of those folks who have taken the time to comment and inquire about the availability of epistemic games. I also want to take a moment to apologize to those who commented and didn’t get a prompt response.

We are glad that educators get excited about epistemic games, and we’re not surprised, because they are exciting to us too! The occasional flipside of this enthusiasm can be frustration that our games are not yet ready for widespread release. The games described on our website are designed to test new ideas about learning. We think of the current epistemic games as monuments (which you can read more about here). While they show how games can help young people learn to think in innovative ways for a changing world, we design them to be studied in detail as best case scenarios. We hope to prepare them for wider distribution, but they are not available for purchase or download currently. We have made some alterations to our site that should make this more clear.

For those who are ready for epistemic games right now, know that we are currently working on many of the obstacles that prevent them from being widely available. This process, however, is an expensive and time-consuming one. If you are inspired about the work we are doing, we urge you to stay in touch. Sign up for the RSS feed on our site. Read David Williamson Shaffer’s book, How Computer Games Help Children Learn. Comment to the regular posts to our blog (we recently fixed a glitch that left some comments unanswered for too long). The important thing is that those of us who see the importance of innovation in education remain a community that shares ideas.

Thanks again for the enthusiasm for epistemic games. The more we can show that there are people out there who believe in epistemic games, the easier our job will be getting them out there.