I posted this on the CT boards but didn't get much of a response apart from a sweet comment from Fanotherpg. I will be running more of these workshops soon and want to make it better. Since the admins here assured me this is a great place for feedback, I post it here.
Here is a little report of a TGF2 workshop I developed and ran at a highschool in Rotterdam. This was part of a media project for my study to get my degree in art education. The school were I ran this workshop is not a usual highschool. The students (aged 12-16) only go here for a maximum of 6 months. Most of them have big behaviour problems and where uncontrollable at their normal school.
The objective was to build a simple game in the demo version of TGF2 using example games and a very simple reader I made. After some playing around in the level editor, learning about the different kinds of objects and learning how to work with the picture/animation editor they had to make their own game. The main focus is on the graphical side of making games (as it had to be an art workshop). The students made their graphics in the picture editor, in photoshop, on paper or by making photographs in and around the building.
The level editor and picture editor were not hard to understand for the students. After messing around with it a bit and asking me some questions they were able to create their own objects and build a level with it. Some students also had a look at the expression editor, which they found hard to understand. This would take more than one workshop to learn to work with. The results were pretty nice, all students came up with a simple game, most of them platformers.
Attached are the English translation of the reader, the original Dutch reader and the 3 example games used for this workshop. Feel free to use any of this material or give feedback.
This is an amazing idea. Getting kids with behavioural problems to sit down and concentrate on one constructive task for any amount of time is no small feat, I know, and I can't think of many more universally appealing activities than getting them to make their own videogame. Game art was probably the safer bet anyway (I realise you had no choice) given that coding would probably frustrate more people than creating art assets would.
What was the general response from the kids?
Anyway, admiral work. Was it rewarding, and is it something you might continue doing after your degree?
The results were really varied but most of the kids really liked it and were able to concentrate on it for longer than I expected. They didn't really have to code much as they were allowed to pick one of the basic example games and change the gfx, so all they had to know is how to work with objects and how to change their appearance.
This was only a group of 10 students, but the school already hired me for more sessions. I am planning to work as a parttime history/art teacher and combine that with workshops like this (I also run cartoon and music workshops) in the future. Maybe I will buy 5 workshop-laptops and drive from school to school in an old VW van.
Wow, this is cool stuff! I wish I had a Hayo for a game development teacher. I used to dream about teaching my classmates how to use TGF1 in fifth grade in the tech lab. Keep up the good work, dude.
I wish I could teach people I know to use MMF2, but that would involve a lot of money on their part (or mine, either way, no one would be able to afford it). Anyway, this is some cool stuff you're doing. It makes me wish that there were an online webcam-based class to be taken, or that I could give a class, or go to a class like this and learn something new.
Congrats, man! It's really great that you're trying to get the word out there to a younger audience. Plus, it keeps them occupied with something, thank goodness!
It's the new trend in education. Apparently started by some guy who saw that kids who program are much more interested in learning. Hence, why those $100 laptops are made more as toys than word processing tools.
It's awesome, though. I'd definitely teach kids with behavorial problems to make games. Not many kids are truly stupid, it's just that they see no reason to learn something. Me, I started learning BASIC as a 5-year-old and went on to taking all this highly complicated stuff, just to make a better game engine. Will be doing my thesis on trying to make a proper virtual reality system. Heck, I'm even thinking of applying for a secondary degree in comp sc. in the USA once I get the money to improve my coding skills. All thanks to this game creation hobby.
So, yeah, this gets my . Would be cool to see more people doing it.
Disclaimer: Any sarcasm in my posts will not be mentioned as that would ruin the purpose. It is assumed that the reader is intelligent enough to tell the difference between what is sarcasm and what is not.
Nice job Hayo. Now I see you can have a soft spot. Great thing you did. Could you upload the kids' games? (Just remove the names for the students' safety) Anyway, love what you did. Like OMC, I wish I had you for my teacher. I'm real bad at gfx.
Thanks for the kind words folks. I am still busy looking at the games they created, all computers used at that school where infested with viruses and I want to be sure the games are virus-free before I post them anywhere.
I applaud you, Hayo! For my day job, I work with adults who have spent time (in some cases, since they were teenagers) in prison. This kind of work provides a creative, positive outlet for struggling peoples' energies--young or old. This reminds me a lot of the recent local developments in "community reinvestment" and alternatives to traditional methods of addressing juveniles acting out. I'm convinced that if more adults simply spent more time with young people and cultivated their creativity, the entire world would be much better off.
In my community, there's a new initiative to create a "free school" where anyone with the interest can learn skills in a low-pressure, no-cost environment. I'd been wanting to develop a game-making workshop for the free school...If you can pass along any information about lesson plans and development of your own program, that would be extremely helpful.
I will probably post everything I do for this workshop here. Right now I am pretty much dying for feedback on the stuff I made so far. All teachers think it's just really cool and can't give me anything to improve this.
First, let me say that I think this a great idea! Developing a workshop on game development (using TGF2) for students with behavior problems is an extremely positive way for them to learn the basic principles of application development - and have fun doing it. I can't wait to hear your feedback on how well the sessions go.
Before I offer any constructive criticism, it would be helpful to understand a few more specifics on the workshop:
How long is the workshop? Is this a half-day, whole-day, or multiple-day class? If it is multiple days, how many hours total do you have with the kids?
How much time do you have to put into the development of the training materials? Do you want to make only small adjustments to the "reader" or are you interested in expanding these materials?
Do you want others to teach this workshop after you stop? If so, is there an agenda for the workshop along with course objectives?
Okay, making just a few assumptions:
This is a multiple-day workshop
You have more time to develop the course materials
Others will eventually teach the workshop
I would recommend the following:
Expand the "reader" into two different documents: Student Guide and a Lab Workbook
1. Student Guide - Explanation of the various aspects of TGF2 (Screen Components, Editors, Properties, Object Types, etc.)
2. Lab Workbook - Step-by-step instructions on multiple labs (which correspond to your lab files)
Develop PowerPoints to correspond with the Student Guide.
NOTES:
There are many different formats that you could use with the Student Guide. I've taught a number of technical classes and the format that I think works best is that of the MOC (Microsoft Official Curriculum) materials. Each page in the guide has the instructor PowerPoint slide on top with the student's expanded text and explanations underneath. With this format, the student can see where the instructor is on the screen and follow along in the Student Guide.
If the MOC format is not appealing (and you'd rather go with more of a document standard) then I have several templates that I've either used and/or developed at a few different companies. These are all Word templates but they do a really good job of organizing information (if you're used to working with Word styles).
The Lab Workbook is essentially going to expand on what you did in the "reader" with the "To start making a game go to File > new". The difference is that the labs will walk the student through each step in the process (whether making a new project, creating an animation, or a full front-to-back game). Organizing labs in this way can help a student go back and repeat a process (even when making a completely different game).
If this sounds like overkill for what you're doing, you can forget I said any of this.
If this doesn't sound like overkill, I'd be happy to put together some examples and help you construct the materials (Student Guide, Lab Workbook, PowerPoints).
Thanks for taking the time to do this Jess, I really appreciate it
- The workshop was supposed to last only 80 minutes, following two other workshops (history of games and a discussion about violence in games) both workshops kind of failed to fly and my workshop had to fill the whole day. So I'd say this material is for a single day but I will expand this to a full project covering about 5 or 6 days to include coding, sound fx/music and pixel art.
- I will put a lot of time in developing this material into a full project and am currently talking with Clickteam about it.
- I will also develop a curriculum and a lesson plan for Clickteam to go with this course.
Currently the main problem is that the Dutch education system is only just getting ready for stuff like this. Most schools don't have beamers yet so powerpoint will be hard to use and the computers are shakey.
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I used to dream about teaching my classmates how to use TGF1 in fifth grade in the tech lab. 
Keep up the good work, dude. 
It's really great that you're trying to get the word out there to a younger audience. Plus, it keeps them occupied with something, thank goodness! 
" and leave. 
Edited by OMC
How long is the workshop? Is this a half-day, whole-day, or multiple-day class? If it is multiple days, how many hours total do you have with the kids?