Book Review: Play to Learn: Everything You Need to Know About Designing Effective Learning Games

Sharon Boller and Karl Kapp have packed a wealth of information into their book, Play to Learn: Everything You Need to Know About Designing Effective Learning Games. This book is about creating learning games. It provides a step-by-step reference from idea conception to actual deployment and evaluation. I picked this book up at the Association for Talent Development Conference. I chose this book because I am a fan of game-based learning and gamification. Additionally, I had seen Karl Kapp speak before and I am a fan of his research.

Play to Learn is 161 pages long. It is arranged in four parts with a total of 12 chapters. It also has seven appendices with worksheets to help with planning a game. The parts of the book include:

• Playing Games to Learn About Games
• Making Game Design Choices That Support Learning
• Putting Game Design Knowledge to Work
• Development and Implementation

There is a lot that I like about this book. For example, at the beginning of each chapter, the authors inserted a concept map to show where the reader was in the nine-step learning-game design process. They also effectively used tables to layout key information.

Boller and Kapp supported Play to Learn with a game that is based on the book. After reading the book and playing the game, I can see how the authors used the different concepts discussed in the book.

At the beginning of the book, Boller and Kapp stressed the importance of going out and playing games. More importantly, they provided a framework to evaluate games to determine what made them engaging. The book introduced a number of terms and concepts to help understand the different elements of successful games.

Throughout the book, Boller and Kapp used real examples to illustrate how they applied the concepts being shared. For example, they shared how they applied their evaluation questions to evaluate the game, Settlers of Catan. Additionally, if you had an ATD membership, you could download the worksheets, which were also located in the appendices of the book.

The layout of the book made it very easy to find information and identify what was critical. They used bulleted lists effectively to present information. One of more helpful tools used in the book was the lists of questions. They created countless lists of questions to help make better decisions when developing learning games.

If you are interested in creating learning games, you will definitely want Play to Learn in front of you as a reference. Using the material shared in this book will help you build a better game. I enjoyed reading this book. I certainly learned quite a bit. A definite recommendation.

Additional Reading

• #astd2013, Interactivity, Games, and Gamification: A research-based approach to engaging learners through games with @kkapp
• Book Review: Game Frame: Using Games as Strategy for Success
• Book Review: SuperBetter: The Power of Living Gamefully
• Book Review: A Theory of Fun for Game Design
• Book Review: The Gamification of Learning and Instruction: Game-based Methods and Strategies for Training and Education
• Book Review: Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World
• Why do many kids like games more than school?
• Are games better than life?

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