Trying to show and tell kids how to balance a budget and manage their money is often a tricky business — but why should it have to feel like business at all? As an online game crafted for 12- to 14-year-olds, Endeavour Island is intended to make financial responsibility as entertaining as it should be informative for younger audiences.
Endeavour Island has a familiar isometric look and feel to it, similar to CityVille or FarmVille, but unlike those aforementioned games, this world has a distinctively educational bent. This virtual world is designed to teach players the virtues of selecting a job, opening a bank account, participating in training, developing products, and trading them in the market place, all while balancing their lifestyle expectations against work-related choices.
Endeavour Island was designed in Christchurch, New Zealand, by CORE Education, a nonprofit research and development company. As the developer, Motim Technologies forms the other half of the partnership behind Endeavour Island.
“It was important that not only was this a fun experience for the students, but that it also has a practical role in the teaching environment,” CORE Education Chief Executive Ali Hughes says. “Ensuring the game was based around solid learning principles and it worked within the curriculum was one of the biggest considerations in the design solution.”
“We were surprised at the lack of solutions out there,” Motim’s Chief Executive Andrew Plimmer adds. “What there was appeared to be very simple and lack really compelling gameplay, which we know is such an important element to getting kids engaged in learning material online. There was clearly an opportunity to develop something which could not only be significant here in New Zealand, but also be scaleable internationally.”
So far, three schools are testing Endeavour Island, but it will eventually be more extensively available in New Zealand.
Metrics and user experience feedback will show and tell how successful this marriage of gamification and financial management is, but apparently Endeavour Online is an unfilled opportunity in edutainment that needs to be addressed. If kids gravitate to it, then they might be entertained as they learn — and parents will breathe a sigh of relief as one of life’s harder lessons is learned a little more easily.
[Source: 3news.co.nz]
[Source: CORE Education]
