Training Games - Recently Updated Pages

Sandbox

Anonymous — Mon, 14 May 2007 19:27:37 CDT

This page is a sandbox - you can practice editing in here.

For example.... what? you expect an example!?!?

About Training Games

Anonymous — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 21:03:49 CST

For our MAR review

Book Reviews

Anonymous — Fri, 21 Jul 2006 13:31:59 CDT

This page (and sub pages) are dedicated to the seemingly endless supply of games compilations and how-to guides.

Here are some placeholders for a few books that Marc Shiman recommended to me (Matthew Cornell - http://ideamatt.blogspot.com/). Marc asked me to put them here.

Thiagi's books (of which there are quite a few):

o Design Your Own Games And Activities
o Framegames by Thiagi (Seventh Edition)
o Facilitator's Toolkit
o Simulation Games by Thiagi (Seventh Edition)

Then there are Steve Sugar's books, e.g.,

o Info-line : More Great Games
o Games That Teach: Experiential Activities for Reinforcing Training

I also found ASTD books, and (seemingly) related ones:

o The ASTD Handbook of Training Design and Delivery
o Training to Imagine: Practical Improvisational Theatre Techniques to Enhance Creativity, Teamwork, Leadership, and Learning
o Telling Ain't Training, by Harold Stolovitch
o Active Training : A Handbook of Techniques, Designs, Case Examples, and Tips, by Mel Silberman, Carol Auerbach
o The Winning Trainer: Winning Ways to Involve People in Learning, by Julius E. Eitington

Stories

marcshiman — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 03:30:46 CDT

There is no abstract available for this page revision.

Articles

marcshiman — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 03:30:00 CDT

There is no abstract available for this page revision.

Games

marcshiman — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 01:24:08 CDT

Here you can find games to use in your trainings. All of the games are open-source, meaning you are free to modify and deliver the training using all or part of the material in your trainings.

Some of the pages here are locked - proprietary content can be commented on, and new pages (variations) can be added. However, as we attributed the work to the author and we cannot easily discern which is the original work and the edits, the original work is locked from editing.

Unless otherwise noted, you are not free to distribute the work unless you provide credit for the person or company that originally created the game. Simple professional courtesy rules here.

The designers of these games would LOVE to hear from you about their work. If you wish to have the designer modify the game to suit your purposes, many will do it for a nominal fee. Please contact the game designer with any questions.

$20 Game

marcshiman — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 01:22:01 CDT

Taken from Thiagi.com

I'm sure that you have handled a $20 bill recently. Did you pay attention to the bill? Do you remember whose portrait is on this bill? Here's a quick jolt that emphasizes the importance of mindfulness. Pair up participants. Ask each participant to find a partner and sit (or stand) facing her. If one participant is left over, you become the partner. Show the money. Ask each pair of partners to produce a $20 bill. If any of the pairs cannot find a $20 bill, lend them one or ask them to use any other bill. Ask the partners to hold a single bill by its opposite corners so that each participant can see only one side of the bill. Begin questioning. Ask partners to take turns asking questions about the side of the bill they can see.

SAMPLES: How many times is the number 20 printed on my side? How many times is the word “twenty” spelled out on my side? How many digits does the serial number have? What building is shown on my side? How many windows do you see in the buidling? Which direction is Jackson facing in the portrait? Complete this sentence found on my side of the bill: This note is legal tender for all debts, _____.

As soon as one partner asks the question, the other partner must give an immediate answer. Correct answers earn a point. Incorrect answers or no answers earn no points. The questioner should immediately give the correct answer. Switch partners. Stop the question-and-answer activity after a few minutes. Ask participants to walk around and find a new partner. (They can also switch to the other side of the bill, if they want). As before, ask the partners to sit or stand facing each other and hold the $20 bill in such a way that they can see only one side. Continue questioning. Ask the partners to use the same procedure as before for asking questions, answering, and scoring points. Conclude the round after about 2 minutes. Conduct a quick debrief. Ask participants to discuss how familiarity breeds mindlessness. What work-related supplies and tools do we take for granted? What are the dangers of ignoring familiar objects and people? What could we gain by paying attention to these objects and people?

Site Map

marcshiman — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 01:18:18 CDT

There is no abstract available for this page revision.

New to wiki?

marcshiman — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 01:16:31 CDT

What is a "wiki" anyway? What exactly can you do with this site?

The central idea of a wiki is a website in which users both read and contribute. Without signing up, you can add pages, edit pages, add text, or just generally comment on the site. Nobody approves what you put (for now) and nobody filters. The site belongs to the very special community of people that use games and simulations in their training activities (or would like to).

To read, just click on the links on the left. There are different sections, the most useful resource being the games depository. Anything in here is in the public domain for you to use as you like. However, if you wish to re-distribute what you find on here, please give credit to those authors that request it.

Editing

The simple thing to do is to click the EasyEdit button above this section. Clicking on this will let you edit what you are reading right now! Anything you do edit will be seen by everyone that opens this page after you save your edits.

Obviously, there is faith that in the community, everyone is looking to continuously improve the site as a resource to them. If the spammers show up and start placing ads, the administrators will have to take some control. For now, this hasn't been a problem with public wikis.

Creating New Content

This is what we are truly looking for - people to add new materials. Its as simple as clicking "add a new page...." on the left hand column. You will be presented with a blank page. Click EasyEdit and you can either cut and paste your content in, or you can type to your heart's delight. Our chosen host for this wiki provides you with basic formatting tools as you'll see in the box that pops up after you hit EasyEdit.

When you add a page, be careful where you place it. When you click "add a new page...." the page will go as a child under whichever page you were last reading. If you wish to add a game, you should go to the games page before adding the page. The administrators can move pages around if you make a mistake.

Do not forget to save your changes!!!!!!!

You can create a page without adding content - this is called a placeholder. If you believe there's an article that needs to be written or a game that needs to be described, create a new page and title it - if thats all you have time for, just leave it there. Someone will come along and add something. When you come back, you may find that article you wanted to write has been written for you!

Structure

For now, the administrators of this wiki are not going to impose too much structure on the wiki contributors. If this site begins to grow and the contributions become unwieldy, we may begin to increase the structure we impose on contributions. For now this is the Wild Wild West.

Using Games in Active Learning

marcshiman — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 01:03:53 CDT

This section is intended to house the who, what, where, and when (but more importantly, how and why) of using games in training. Games add considerably to the process of learning. However, games selected badly or executed poorly can detract from the learning experience.

Please feel free to add your own advice and stories to this section.

Service Provider Role

marcshiman — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 07:33:49 CDT

You have had a very bad day. It started when you were involved in an accident earlier in the day. Once in the office, it was the usual pushing and shoving in the queues. As usual people have been yelling at you all day long. About a half-hour ago, your supervisor called you into his office and yelled at you for something that you did last week. The final straw has been that you ran out of F-150 forms just 20 minutes ago. The day is almost over.

A guy who tried to cut the queue is now standing in front of your window. About an hour ago you sent him to the back of the queue. He looks pretty angry.

Customer Role

marcshiman — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 07:32:29 CDT

You have had a bad day. It seems that every government department you’ve visited today has been a disaster. Either the person you want to see is on vacation, or your application isn’t ready, or you have had to resubmit your applications for minor reasons. You even sense that some of the officers just want bribes, although you refuse to pay them.

It is now towards the end of the day. All you want from this office is the form F-150. When you tried to just pick up the form, you were told to get to the back of the queue. You just want to get the form and go home. However, you will not leave until you get this form.

You now finally reach the window after a 40-minute wait. The clerk who sent you to the back of the queue waits for you expectantly.

Ask for the form.

This exercise will be used to illustrate a confrontation. Try to place yourself in the mind of the customer in this case.

Motivation for Customer Service

marcshiman — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 07:30:17 CDT

When training people to provide top quality customer service, trainers often mistakenly assume that there is a universal motivation to improve the service given to people. Providing exceptional service often requires providers to take that extra step, and work extra hard; while most learners recognize that this is to the benefit of their firm, they may not feel its important enough for them to work extra hard at it.

There is also a personal benefit to working hard to please customers - the job itself becomes considerably more satisfying and enjoyable if their customers are delighted. Conversely, poor service providers are often engaged in confrontations; it is difficult for most employees to not take the feelings of anger home with them after a particularly strenous argument.

The following roleplay will cause a fight - that's what its here for. Even if the service provider tries to help the customer, inevitably it will break down into an argument.

In order to play the game, simply hand the customer form to the person playing the role of customer, and the service provider form to the person playing the role of service provider. This game is set up for government. You can modify it depending on the circumstances of your training.

Allow the arguing to take place for 30 seconds or so; it need not go on longer than a minute. Stop the fight and immediately confront the "service provider". Ask them how they feel right now, how much stress they are under. Ask them how long it will take them to get rid of the feeling. Ask them if they like the feeling.

This can be followed with a dialogue about how positive interactions are much more satisfying than stressful ones. If this roleplay is done at the beginning of the training, let your participants know that by following what they learn in the training, their personal experience at work will dramatically improve.

Home

marcshiman — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 06:52:44 CDT

Welcome to Training Games, an anyone-can-contribute wiki to be shared by all trainers worldwide who have an interest in active learning.

Thanks are in order to Thiagi, the game designer extrodinaire, performance improvement guru, and champion of the open source for providing a number of games to this site that you can freely use in your training. At his website, there is a newsletter which is highly recommended.

Links

marcshiman — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 05:30:12 CDT

On this page you will find some of the premier gaming and simlulation resources on the Internet:

NASAGA
ISAGA
Thiagi
Trainer's Warehouse