A flurry of interest has arisen around the potential of digital games, simulations and interactives to promote humanities learning. Foundations and universities have invested millions of dollars into developing these games, yet many are built, tested, and promptly shelved, played by only a handful of students during the pilot testing phase. There is no comprehensive directory to connect teachers with these resources. If high quality educational games are to reach teachers and their students, there is a clear need to build a collaborative directory for sharing information. PlayingHistory.org is on track to be exactly this sort of directory, but we can use your help ensure it's success. I will give a walk-through of the site wireframes and functionality, and participants can try out the 30 game sample set. This session will expose AAHC members to a variety of historical games and lay a foundation for members involvement in both using the site as a resource for their own classes and as historian game reviewers.

1. Let's Build an Open Collaborative
Repository of Historical Games
Presented at the American Association
Trevor Owens
for History and Computing’s
playinghistory.org and trevorowens.org
Annual Conference, April 4th, 2009
Trevor.johnowens@gmail.com

2. PRETEND THIS IS FIVE SLIDES ABOUT WHY YOU
SHOULD CARE ABOUT GAMES AND EDUCATION...
GOOD, NOW LETS MOVE ON

3. EVERYBODY IS MAKING FREE HISTORY GAMES

4. SOME ARE VERY NEAT

5. OTHERS, NOT SO MUCH…

6. FAIL
SO HOW DO WE FIND THEM?

7. AND WHEN WE FIND THEM THEN WHAT??

8. HOW DO THESE GAMES CONNECT TO TEACHERS NEEDS?
HOW DO THE GAMES ARGUMENTS WORK WITH AND
AGAINST OTHER PRESENTATIONS OF HISTORICAL
CONTENT?

9. THIS ONES EASY! WE CAN SOLVE IT!

10. 1. LETS CATALOG THEM

11. 2. RATE AND REVIEW THEM

12. THE HISTORIANS CAN MUSE ABOUT HISTORICITY

13. TEACHERS CAN TALK ABOUT TEACHABILITY,

14. WHILE STUDENTS PLAY GAMES
AND CRITIQUE THEIR ARGUMENTS

15. SO REGISTER,
AND LETS GET
STARTED!