Research has shown that even very young children have beliefs or intuitions of right and wrong. In the game world of Crypto, questers must decide whether to respect the island’s rules or uncover its secrets, particularly, whether to take artifacts out of the jungle or leave them undisturbed. This is a key dilemma in archeology; to whom to artifacts belong, and where should they be displayed? On the one hand, countless countries have been robbed of precious artifacts and keys to their history by other nations who are more powerful or have more resources. On the other hand, if artifacts stay only with the site where they were discovered, then peoples around the world lose an opportunity to better understand others’ histories. These tensions are exactly what the questers are asked to contend with.

As an example, one character, Archie, offers the quester cols in exchange for artifacts they remove from the island and deliver.

He also notes the importance of allowing others to learn about the important history of the island.  Thus questers may choose to take artifacts either for personal gain, or in the interest of spreading knowledge about the island. Alternatively, players who feel that the island should be able to keep its secrets, or feel that Archie has immoral intentions, may choose to leave the artifacts in the sand.

By providing a space for children to make choices based on their own beliefs about right and wrong, CryptoCoordinates allows them to personalize the narrative of the island and contribute their own perspective. It’s important to note that the space does not instruct students about “what is right,” but allows children to grapple with these moral questions on their own, determining what they individually feel is right or wrong. When a variety of characters and rules are presented (as in Crypto), there is no obvious right or wrong choice.

Rather than providing answers, games can offer narrative tensions and difficult questions so that individuals propel themselves forward by advancing a moral argument. Adding a moral tension into a narrative creates a path to the player’s own beliefs and intentionality. The player must exercise their intentions in order to progress within the game.

In games and in classrooms, asking questions in which there is no right answer opens up spaces for conversations that are often lost when the focus is simply on questions with a predetermined answer. We have seen that students exhibit a variety of beliefs and support their beliefs in many different ways, many unimagined by the designers. They often either elaborate on game elements (“What if there’s a curse? You might get your head chopped off!”) or real world elements (“What if it’s illegal?” or “I like my secrets to be left alone.”). They may instantly personalize the experience by judging an action or concept as right or wrong, and are empowered because their opinion cannot be deemed right or wrong. As a consequence, asking more difficult questions (questions without answers), in games or otherwise, may prove more motivating and engaging than questions without the same tensions and with existing answers.

A new unit in Quest Atlantis hopes to provide answers to these questions and create a path towards pre-service teachers’ situated and contextualized learning. The unit consists of four missions that focus on cognitive development, learning theories, motivation, and assessment. The unit is currently offered as one of  IU’s undergraduate pre-service classes and is primarly available to teachers who are ready for their field experience. The key themes of providing agency, offering legitimate roles, and the illustrating opportunities to make a change in the world appear strongly throughout the whole experience, just as they do in our student experiences.

Learners enter the game as consultants in an educational evaluation company. The narrative involves a local school facing several dilemmas related toto ways of dealing with students and enhancing their participation, improving instruction and assessing learning. Eva, the boss at the Consulting Company, describes the situation, and then the consultants embark on a journey where they must interview experts, teachers, and students in the space, participate in online discussions, and play mini games that determine their trajectory. Teachers also develop a perspective which they adopt as they engage several key issues.

Throughout the unit teachers can reflect on the effectiveness of the instruction at the fictional school.  Students at this school appear unmotivated when the teacher assigns homework that is abstract or apart from what they know, and the students cannot get good grades on their tests because the knowledge they come across is de-contextualized. Further, teachers struggle as to which approach to adopt to meet the needs of their students. Such dilemmas create the need for investigation. This is where the consultant’s role becomes powerful. By talking to teachers about their practices and approaches and by talking to the students, they develop a greater insight into the atmosphere at the school. At the end of each mission, consultants are required to provide a report to their boss that includes recommendations to solve the dilemmas they encountered.

The results from these pre-service teacher’s test scores are currently being compared with the scores of those undergraduate students that took the same class last fall through Oncourse, the university’s online platform. There, the class was set up providing short cases that needed resolutions. In other words, the same content was taught in a different context. The score comparisons so far indicate several significant differences between the undergraduate students’ performance. The contextualization of the content in Quest Atlantis seems to be providing a coherent understanding of how theory can be reflected into practice, as well as how instructional decisions can impact learning.

Introductory "Message in a Bottle"

In commencing their mission, Questers are faced with a series of tests from the island’s inhabitants to see if the Quester is interested in anything beyond her own mission. First, the quester must prove their worthiness and mathematical talent to Ivo (a very intimidating) boar. Then, they must make their way to the cave of The Grand Wise One, who will decide whether the quester may continue. The problem is two-fold—traveling along the jungle path, with perils hidden at every turn, and earning the respect of the island so that it will choose to reveal Dr. Leo’s whereabouts. In helping the island’s inhabitants solve problems that they face, questers begin to earn the trust of the island. However, a punishment awaits if they wander from the island’s endorsed path. The tests don’t stop there; questers are also faced with the dilemma of retrieving artifacts that may be destroyed or displayed for the world to see, or to leave artifacts in their place, letting the island keep its secrets.

Map of Cryptojungle

Throughout the mission, Questers learn about the coordinate graphing system and its conventions, and practice skills such as placing and locating points on the graph, translating two-dimensional directions into three-dimensional movements, and being able to describe routes to others by using the standard conventions of graphing. At the end of the Mission, students are faced with the ultimate choice: Enter a secret location of the island to save Dr. Leo (and keep the island’s secrets), or pursue their own fame and insatiable curiosity by dissecting the island artifacts with Archie. The choice, ultimately, is the Quester’s—although they are also the ones who have to face the consequences of their choices.

The Grand Wise One and Ivo the Boar