His research and simulation design work, which he conducted outside of the influence and prescription of academic and grant-giving institutions, resulted in a series of articles, speeches, and five books. He argues that computer games represent new, 'post-linear' models for capturing and representing content, but that new computer game genres will have to be created, optimized for learning as well as entertainment. His published research, beginning in 1999, outlined the failure of formal education approaches to teach leadership, innovation, and other strategic skills, and then advocated interactive experiences borrowing techniques from current computer games as media to fill these gaps. He has been the lead designer for several educational simulations, including SimuLearn's Virtual Leader which won best online training product of the year in 2004 by Training Media Review and the American Society for Training and Development's T+D Magazine - the first game-like product to win. It was a fantastic conversation.Ĭheck out the full session including the always-informative chat right here.Ĭlark Aldrich is an author and practitioner in the field of educational simulations and serious games for education and professional skills. There are many reasons to consider short sims and we covered most of them. In most cases, keeping the writing short and simple, as well as the imagery, is exactly what is required. But the point Clark strongly emphasized is that with short sims it should be easy for everyone to make one. more realist photographic representations. The chat room also discussed the varying opinions on using clipart vs. It ended up being a great conversation and most of us landing at the need to create a solid balance between too little and too much corrective feedback. However, our very astute chat room questioned that and asked if perhaps there is more learning in allowing the user to fail completely because that’s what would happen in the real world. One of the most important questions to ask is, “where are mistakes made?” Once you fully understand the work, the doing, then writing the branching structure becomes easy.Īn important point made early in the conversation is to not let the learner travel too far down the wrong path without corrective feedback. The important work, he explained, is in the design – connecting with your SMEs and workers to better understand the process, the doing.

Clark shared examples of short sims and explained how easy it is to create them.

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