Monthly Archives: June 2009

PeaceMaker: Launching the Educator Community

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I am writing to announce the launch of a PeaceMaker Educator Forum.  We have now had over 2 years of teachers and students playing PeaceMaker.  Over these 2 years we have had many inquiries from teachers, researchers, and even prestigious press organizations as to how the use of PeaceMaker has contributed to classroom and out of classroom learning.  Who better to answer these questions then those of you who are teachers and students.

We would be very grateful if you could quickly answer the following relevant survey.  I promise you that it is a very short survey and will only take a couple moments of your time.

Educator Survey

Student Survey

The goal of this outreach is to create a central repository and community where you can share with each other all of the different ways that PeaceMaker can be used to enrich learning and community initiatives, provide testimonials to promote the use of PeaceMaker in and out of the classroom, and create a list of individuals that are willing to be contacted by peers and press.  We would love for you to visit the Forum at forum(dot)impactgames(dot)com (sorry for not hyperlinking it but it has started to be apammed), and even better to contribute your own testimonials and lesson plans for others to learn from.

We greatly appreciate your continued support.

Play the News – Call for Partners

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We have recently outlined two new projects that ImpactGames would love to pursue.  Based on multiple discussions we have had with leaders in the educational space and our own internal experience with creating content for both ourselves and clients we feel there is a timely and genuine potential for the use of our Play the News Platform as a teaching and training tool.  We welcome you to review the following proposals:

(1) Play the News in the classroom (K-12) – A proposal that focuses on the creation of educational modules for a range of subjects: 

Download Educational Proposal Here

(2) Play the News to teach new media journalism – A proposal that focuses on teaching new forms of journalism and discussing the future of interactive journalism:

Download Journalism Education Proposal Here

As always we are continuing our discussions with media outlets and content providers that are looking to broaden their digital and community offerings.  You can view our media partner presentation here:

Download Media Partner Proposal Here

We are also open to other creative applications and ideas on how our work can be integrated with other efforts.  We hope that these proposals will serve as a starting point for discussions.

PeaceMaker: An Index Award Finalist

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We are excited to announce that PeaceMaker, our first game, was selected as a finalist in the prestigious contest INDEX: Design to Improve Life.  

The INDEX organization was founded by the Danish Government under the patronage of HRH The Crown Prince and is regarded as one of the biggest design awards in the world. Kigge Hvid, CEO of INDEX: explains, “INDEX:’s mission is to ensure more Design to Improve Life of higher quality in the world. Therefore we inspire, collect, advocate, communicate, evaluate, connect and discuss Design to Improve Life globally.”

The finalist’s works will be presented in a touring exhibition that premieres in August 2009 in Copenhagen and travels throughout Denmark and Internationally.  The award is given to winners in five categories – Body, Home, Work, Play and Community (all to be announced August 28).  Among other finalists in the Play category are Nike Trash Talk, City Invader and the Recycle Factory.  You can view all of the finalists here.

PTN Wins the Knight Foundation Award for News Gaming

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We are very honored that Play The News won the First Knight News Game Award.  The winner was announced at the Games for Change Annual Festival last week.  According to the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation the award “honors the best of this exciting new genre: games which are journalistic and strengthen people’s ability to make decisions in a democracy.”  You can read the full press release here.

We really hope that this great recognition will support our current effort in finding new educational partners and venues for the use of the platform.  The other finalists who were honored at the event are the Budget Maze by the Gotham Gazette, Hurricane Katrina: Tempest in Crescent City by Global Kids and September 12th, the iconic news game created by Gonzalo Frasca and his team that many attribute to coining the phrase “newsgaming”.