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Dan White is the founder and CEO of filament games, an educational game company that's been breaking new ground and game based learning for 18 years. Dan believes that good gameplay and good learning are complementary rather than oppositional forces. an alumnus of Cornell University and the University of Wisconsin Madison.
Dan earned an MS in educational technology under Seminole learning game scholars, doctors Kurt Squire and James Paul G. Prior to founding filament in 2005, dan worked as a teacher and instructional designer and a game developer. Dan's passions include learning games, sustainability, mindfulness, and modernizing institutional education. Dan White, Welcome to EdTech insiders. Good to be
here. You have been in educational gaming for a long time, I think of you as sort of one of the absolute pioneers of game based education gamified education, the marriage of education and gaming. Tell us a little bit about what filament does and the history of how you've seen gaming over the last, I think 10 years plus.
Yeah, so filament was founded 18 years ago, which every time I say that I still I don't believe it myself. But yeah, it's been 18 years on this
particular crazy road. And the way we got started is so I was in graduate school at the University of Wisconsin, I was very fortunate to study under a lot of the luminaries in the space, the James apologies, the Kurt Squires, Constantine coolers, rich, Halverson, a lot of sort of household names in the learning game space, the people who were putting out some of the best rhetoric around games and learning at the time,
and still are. And essentially, I was kind of a black sheep in the program, because I was more of a builder than a researcher. So it was, basically I just wanted to take all that rhetoric and put it into practice, right, because I was a gamer myself, my two founding partners, Dan and Alex, were also gamers, we all believed in the power of the technology to do more than
entertain. But there were precious few examples of learning games that did more than just kind of skill and drill or practice oriented mechanics. And at the same time, we were steeping in all this rhetoric around how good video games could do amazing things for learning if they were well designed and well engineered. So that's what we set out to build. And we started with a prototype of an ocean science game that took place on an alien planet.
And we wanted to deliver the experience of being on the frontier of science as opposed to learning what other people had already discovered. So we equipped the player with the tools, sort of a sandbox, open ended sandbox research space, we equip them with the tools of research and set them free in the space to answer interesting research questions. And that prototype was frankly, held together with duct tape and
string. But it wasn't enough to land as a presentation at a conference, the serious games Conference, which doesn't exist anymore, but was thinking way back in the day and was very fortunate to have a member of the audience during the presentation from a foundation that was funding a subsidiary of National Geographic to build an ocean science curriculum. And they said, hey, you know, this, I think this game would pair, you know, make this about the
real world. And I think it's compare really well with this curriculum. So we wrote a grant proposal, and it was my first one ever, I had no idea how grant proposals worked, or what you asked for. So I was like, Hey, give us a million bucks. Cuz apparently, I was feeling cheeky. And for some reason they did. And so we used that to build out our staff. And that was our first our first big contract. That's really
interesting. I think the first game that I heard about filament through was iCivics. And I think that's a really interesting sort of use case for Educational Gaming, sort of in argumentation. It's sort of like a, it's a really interesting game. I'd love to hear your description of that, just because it's it's one that I think will give our listeners a good sense of how you think about gaming.
Yeah, the iCivics games are terrific, because it's one I mean, they're definitely one of our longest standing partners. I think we started working with them in 2008. We've made at least 20 games with them. There's more on the way about, like you say all sorts of different topics around civics. There's a whole game based civics curriculum at this point that's free, used in all 50 states by by the vast majority of civics educators. So it's just it's really cool because
it's for two reasons. One is Well, actually, many reasons but to to point out, one is that the games are just really well suited toward the classroom implementation, right. So in terms of how long they take, and the depth of the mechanics, things of that nature, but at the same time, they're still real games, right? Like you still have interesting problem spaces to interact with interesting problems to solve, challenging decisions to make.
But at the same time, they they they fit in that classroom period, which is a really tight thing to balance. The other thing that's super cool about iCivics is that well, as I mentioned, the the adoption, and how long they've been around for, there's just not that many examples that you can point to of educational games, or educational game based curricula that have stood the test of time
like that. And I think a big part of that is, well, one thing is they definitely fill an underserved niche, right, because a lot of times, civics education is overlooked by the bigger publishers, because it's just not that big of a market. And to is, you know, the the organization was founded by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. And her star power, combined with the fact that a Supreme Court justice was advocating for games for education was just such a
juicy news angle, right? So we got so much press coverage in the early days of iCivics, because people wanted to report on how a Supreme Court justice was using game based learning in order to that was a big part of her legacy. Right. So I think the combination of those things make iCivics just a really, really unique organization and a really unique curriculum. And they've just had a tremendous impact over the years. It's, it's something that I think we're all really proud
of. You mentioned, you know, the difference between research and practice. And, you know, what does it take to design games like, like the iCivics games that are both real games, as you say, but also work in a classroom environment can actually be incorporated into schools. And I've followed this field for a long time as well. And it always surprises me, when I look at sort of some of the top sites that are used in this
kind of world. I see sites like, you know, coolmath, games still being used everywhere all over the country, just because it works so well in the classroom. It's something that people can
just just set up. Tell us a little bit about, you know, as you're doing your research, as you're working with these these luminaries in Wisconsin, how did you plan to sort of get move past that practice based curriculum, because it's so easy for that to be picked up that sort of drill and kill again and again, you know, put numbers on the, you know, robots and then shoot the robots kind of game? Alright. I'd love to hear just how do you get past that when it's so appealing? It's so easy to use?
Yep, I think you hit the nail on the head with word easy. I think anytime you're talking about implementing any kind of new technology in a classroom, the first question is, what sort of barriers to entry are there? And how do we absolutely minimize friction as much as possible. And, frankly, that's been a big part of what has held the learning games, space back well, across the
years, right. And I think back to some of the earliest games that we developed, which required a download on a PC, you required a beefy graphics card, or at least by by school standards, and the game itself was really cool. And it's an experience that I wish more students could have had. But the barriers to entry were simply too high. And immediately after making that game, we actually made a flash game called coaster crater with the jason project.
And coaster crater was a much simpler game, in terms of the game mechanics, you were learning about potential and kinetic energy by building a roller coaster, piece by piece, but I mean, it's basically like you're in and playing in a matter of seconds. And the problem space was just the right size for a typical, you know, classroom period that's focused on potential and kinetic energy.
But at the same time, you also had the ability to, you know, every student's experience was a little bit different, because they could all design different roller coasters. And so, I like that as an example, because I think it checks the easy box, but it doesn't cater to the lowest common denominator, right? It tries to deliver a sufficiently complex problem space, to afford room for students to engage in some pretty deep thinking about those physics properties in that particular example,
speaking of, you know, not being the best person in the room of the game. You know, one other aspect of gaming and education that people have wrestled with for quite a while, is the idea of commercial off the shelf games. They used to call them you know, games that are not designed at all for education, but can be sort of repurposed or bent into an educational use case and you know, back in the Wisconsin days, that was civilization could that be used as an
educational tool? Then we saw things like Minecraft EDU or portal did a whole edu You know, education in instance. And now we see things like, you know, fortnight or Roblox being sort of used in different ways in the classroom, specifically, because the students are better at it than the teachers, they care
about it. And if if, you know, if you connect what's happening in the classroom to commercial games, there's at least a belief that that might, you know, create engagement about the kind of subjects people are learning. What is your take on that approach? And obviously, is not the approach that filament it goes for itself. But what is your take on it?
I think commercial off the shelf games are terrific teaching tools, I just think it's much harder, like so apropos to what we were just talking about about that, you know, barriers to entry. Yeah, the number of barriers and the height of those barriers is extremely high for commercial off the shelf games. But the potential upside potential reward of using those types of experiences is extremely high as
well. I mean, let's let's be real, like, we will never at a learning game company, like filament have the budget to develop something as complex and expansive as what a triple a studio like for access developing a game like civilization is able to develop, so they can just make so much more game, they can make much deeper, much bigger systems, the system behind civilization is so sprawling and complex, it makes
my head spin. And that creates just absolutely incredible learning opportunities, right. But at the same time, because it's not explicitly designed for educational scenarios, certainly not designed to be you know, like iCivics, to be used in a 45 minute classroom period. Effectively, it requires a lot of back bending on the part of the educator in order to make it
work. And I know a lot of teachers who do and they impressed the heck out of me, then they sort of surmount all of those high barriers in order to deliver those types of experiences. But I don't think those types of experiences will ever be mainstream inside of the
classroom. And I wish we lived in the type of world where the education system sort of created that level of permission to play, if you will, sort of where there were just large, long form opportunities for students to dive really deep into a big meaty experience. And I think you you see a little bit of that with project based curriculum. And there, there are pockets of opportunity for that type of experience throughout the
system. But it's definitely a long way away from being anything that mainstream are available to most students.
I think that's a really thorough and clear explanation. I totally agree. I respect teachers who can do it, but it's a lift, it's, you really have to fight for that to happen. Yes. So speaking of Roblox, speaking of new gaming platforms, you have been around for a number of different generations of different types of games, and you've learned a lot of things on the way, tell us about some of the exciting projects that filament is working on now in this expanded game environment.
Yeah. So right now a big part of my personal fascination and focus is on digital robotics. And a big part of the reason for that is that robotics is like this super like this stem super food. It's just so packed full of really useful skills outside of the classroom,
in the age that we live in. And increasingly, in an age where the workforce is changing as a result of mechanization, automation, machine learning, AI, etc. And I just I'm having a lot of, and maybe this is, maybe some of this is, is my thinking as a father bleeding into my thinking as a professional, but I'm really concerned about whether or not K 12 is going to be able to adapt quickly enough to prepare students for a workforce that is changing dramatically right before our
eyes on a timescale that will make anybody's head spin, right? So like, are we arming and equipping students with the skills that they needed to succeed in that world, and add value in that world when so many jobs are changing, or going away or being replaced by computers
or machines? Ironically, that's part of what drew me toward robotics because, as I mentioned, that the types of skills that you develop in the process of thinking about engineering a robotic space solution to a real world problem, are broadly broadly applicable problem solving
skills. And you know, that you've got design thinking, you've got engineering thinking, you've got creativity, problem solving, obviously critical thinking, like just all those future facing skills that are probably going to be really important in the decades to come for students. The problem, of course, is is that robotics is and we were just sort of talking about the barriers to entry for long form or commercial off the
shelf video games. They're significantly higher yet I think, even for physical based robotics programs. The kits themselves are extremely expensive. The learning curve Have is extremely high. And so as a result, there's just very few people who are able to access those types of experiences. And one of the advantages of video games is that we can deliver, really, as I mentioned, kind of really deep, meaningful complex experiences and problem spaces at very low cost by virtue of
putting it in software. That's exactly what we set out to do with our digital robotics platform. So we're building a game called Robo Co. And we're building a sister game to that called Robo co sports league, which is on the Roblox platform. And they're basically what you would, and we're partnered with FIRST Robotics on both of these experiences, and they will be on PC VR, we've got some funding from meta to bring, bring the
game to VR. And then by virtue of being on Roblox, you get access to pretty much every platform, you know, tablet, phone, etc. And what we're essentially trying to do is take that same robotics experience of problem solving through the design of robots to complete tasks, just trying to make it as accessible as possible, but not only in terms of costs also, in terms of that sort of onramp write the learning curve and trying to make it as appealing and easy to learn as possible in
the software by building in as many scaffolds as possible. So starting with easier challenges and graduating the students progressively toward harder
challenges. robocall sports league is a little bit so Robo CO is a single player robotics experience where you have a huge kit of robotics parts, your gears, your pistons, your servo, motors, springs, etc. You build pretty much any robot, you can imagine, in order to solve problems like the very first level in the game, you have to build a robot that can deliver a sandwich to a table at a bistro.
Toward the end of the game, you're building robots that can cross gaps and turn valves and perform other sorts of complex tasks. The robot sports league is multiplayer. So you are for those familiar with the first robotics program, this will sound very familiar, but essentially you're building robots and then taking them into competitive arenas, or collaborative arenas, like a soccer arena, for example. And then you play a game of soccer with the robot that you've built
in real time. And then players iterate on their designs, based on how those games go,
oh, that sounds so much, like so much fun. I really want to try those myself. They sound amazing. You know, it strikes me when you talk about robotics and the barrier to entry. I remember taking I went to a really, you know, amazing school, and they had chess lessons for us at the school, which is was, well, it felt so special and unusual. We had this really amazing chess
teacher. And you know, you hear now about some schools, sometimes they're private school, sometimes schools with particular, you know, specialties, having robotics, you know, curriculum or labs, the idea of bringing this to everyone is incredibly exciting. I want to ask you about one aspect of it, which is the
instructors. So when you talk about the learning curve for, you know, starting a robotics curriculum or robotics club at a school, the first thing that I always think of is, well, you need probably at least one adult who cares a lot about this, who either knows about it, or is willing to learn about it, or at least is willing to sponsor it and sort of stand by while the kids really go into it. This seems to not need expert
teachers. I'm curious how you see that is that not that it replaces them just that it allows them to learn as well,
two things that are worth pointing out. One is that we see this as supplementary or augmentative to physical programs as opposed to replacements. In an ideal scenario, we would say their advantages the digital robotics experience and advantages of the physical. In a perfect world, they'd have both. And I would say the same thing for the educator support in a perfect world, there would be both Robo CO and Robo sports, they can stand alone if they need to.
There are people who play these games for fun just on their own, somebody just recently built an entire 3d printer inside of the game, which still blows my mind, a functional 3d printer. So if you want to get if you want to get crazy, you can build some really cool stuff. You know, most people like that person is probably a professional engineer in real life than a student who's entering the game for the
first time. Do they benefit from the support of somebody who's familiar with robotics or even an adult who isn't as a coach or mentor? Absolutely 100% Like they will learn so much more, and they will progress so much more quickly. So just for example, you know, let's say the student encounters the first the part of the game where they're exposed to the concept of torque, we have these little Robo repair tutorials where you are given a robot that is fully built but broken, and you have
to figure out how to fix it. And one of those is on concept of torque. So the first time that you are experiment like experimenting with the properties of a motor and adjusting the torque in the game, I think you will develop a sort of tacit understanding of how of what torque is and why it
matters and robotics. But if you then are interacting with an educator or a coach around that concept outside of the game, either beforehand or afterwards, and sort of driving that concept home and sort of talking about it in the broader context of physics, then you know, that student is going to learn so much more. So yeah, 100%, like the more support from an expert or an adult coach, the better. Yet,
if you don't have an adult or a coach in a classroom, at least you can do a really thorough and deep and meaningful virtual experience
either. Exactly. Yeah. And that's really the I mean, that's what we're always trying to do with software is like, how do we make it as easy as possible? While not sort of dumbing down the experience? Again, that walking that tightrope? How do we make it deployable? And as flexible scenario as possible? How do we make it so that it could work inside a technology class, but could also be played at home? By a student who's on their own?
How do we make it so that it would work in an after school program, etc, you know, where there's a coach present when one weather's not? So we want to offer as flexible deployment possibilities as possible, without making it a one size fits all experience that is necessarily more simple than it should be a
variety of implementation options. Do you see this these tools being used at the higher education level? As well as that part of the thinking?
Yeah, I mean, there's certainly in our community of people who play the game just for fun. I mean, there are definitely colleges, students and, and adult professionals, by virtue of just how complex the software, how do I say this? Basically, if you're if you're new to it, it can be simple to build simple robots. But if you're advanced, then you can the tool keep up with you, basically, the game will keep up
with you. So yeah, 100%, like it can be used, you know, my, we've been developing it for six years, my son's 10, he's been playing it that whole time, obviously, with some support from me. So you know, it could work in grade school for if you know, if there is sufficient adult scaffolding, which at that level, there definitely would need to be. But yeah, at the same time, a professional or somebody who's in a college level engineering course, could actually could absolutely use the game as well.
I want to jump back to something you said that really stuck with me a few minutes ago, which is the gap between, you know, the speed at which K 12 education in the US, especially, you know, adapts, and the speed at which technology is changing, and how, you know, the way we're all seeing this totally different
worlds sort of coming at us. I love this focus on robotics, because I think that in this moment, right now, people are thinking of artificial intelligence and machine learning, as you mentioned, as something that sort of happens in a computer. It's something that you know, happens on a phone, maybe it's a intelligence that you can access there can build things for you like, you know, graphics. But realistically, that is not at all the extent of where artificial intelligence and
machine learning is. And this physical manifestation, this sort of embodied artificial intelligence or embodied, you know, machine intelligence is really coming fast in a very different way. We just don't think about it that much from the education standpoint, because we're not in advanced manufacturing. Talk to us a
little bit. I think this, you know, you've been looking at this for years, about the sort of relationship between the type of you know, AI, that is in the headlines right now, the chat TPTs. And this type of roboticized embodied, you know, mechanization, automation, that is actually physical and how both of them are going to affect the future, we could
do a whole podcast on that topic, by itself. And of course, all of this is changing rapidly, right? So just for example, rubber CO is one of the first tools where we afford the player the opportunity to engage in both the mechanical and the computer engineering aspects of robotics. Usually, it's just the
programming aspect. And Robocop obviously, you can, you can build any robot from scratch, the thing that's, we're kind of over here patting our selves on the back about that, and then realizing, well, you know, in the near future, engineers will be designing robots with the assistance of an AI and it won't look anything like they currently do and get like the current professional practice in
CAD, for example. And so what does it mean to teach mechanical engineering or to deliver a mechanical engineering experience that will actually translate in some meaningful way to how the mechanical engineers of the future will think about robot design? Right, because first we grappled with this question of like, oh, once it's digital, as opposed to physical and you're not actually soldering things together and screwing things together. or is
it still engineering? And of course, we arrived at the conclusion Well, yeah, 100%, because it's about the cognition that's taking place in your head, like the design thinking that's happening in your head. And if as long as we get you thinking like an engineer and thinking about the problems in the same way and thinking about the solutions in the same way, then you're performing the same
professional practice. But then the question is, how does it change, if you go from an interface where you are building robots in a sort of CAD, like environment, CAD, like 3d environment, manually versus working with an AI like chat, GPT and saying, OK, computer, create a chassis, that's about gay big, now add an arm to it.
Now extend that arm out, now make that arm able to pivot 360, you know, and you basically just describe, you know, you sort of CO build your co design with an AI that's working off of a model that's informed by millions and millions of robot designs? And is that effectively the same mechanical engineering process that requires the same type of cognition? Or are we now talking about a totally different way of thinking about mechanical engineering? And accordingly, do we need to think differently
about how we teach it? Right? So I'm definitely I would never be the type of person to say that everything that we do in K 12, education, or even post secondary for that matter, should be 100% informed by what the professional practice looks like on the other side, because that's always going to be changing, even independent of the sort of current revolution that is happening in terms of AI and mechanization. But it should definitely inform how we think
about it, right. So to that end, we are in fact, in the process of writing a proposal to the National Science Foundation to try to integrate a machine learning building interface into Robo co so that you could work with a chat GPT like interface, and sort of CO build robots with an AI, you know, we'll never be
able to keep up, right? Because we built you know, when we build the game like Robo Robo sports league, we are very, very much at the cutting edge, kind of far out ahead of where a lot of the field is at. And yet we are still at the same time, ironically, behind where the field of professional practices. So it's always going to be a question of finding that balance point between how things were done in the real world versus how, how we teach them in the classroom,
try to make a very convoluted, nuanced point here. And if this doesn't land, just tell me but you're definitely on the cutting edge of what what games can do what robotics education looks like,
no question. I would even say that, if artificial intelligence and machine learning was put into the process of computer assisted design, and that grant comes through and in students can then come in and say and work with, you know, an artificial intelligence to build a robot that doesn't actually make the knowledge of torque or the ability to, you know, create a robot that jumps gaps. You know, without that artificial intelligence, it certainly doesn't make that skill
obsolete. And we're seeing this across education, right. I mean, one of the I think, really, I don't know, ironic parts, or strangely frictionally parts of what's going on with AI right now is that artificial intelligence is making things that students learn easier to do. I mean, it's easier to write an essay. Now it's easier to do a math problem, it's easier to do a science lab because of Jaggi Beatty. But at the same time, learning how to do it with
Chachi. Beatty, is arguably the future of professional work, right? So it's both easier as a student and you can do incredible things as a student. But you're also preparing to actually use these cutting edge crazy tools. I mean, your son who's 10, when he's, you know, 25? Can you even imagine what he will have access to to be able to work in the world and in any
capacity? So I guess the question is, building AI and ML into an amazing program like this can actually lower the barrier to entry even further, because you could build a robot without even needing to yet understand the mechanics or some of the engineering. And I think that's a good thing. How do you square the idea that it might make it easier, which is, you know, a theme of this conversation easier to implement, but also might actually remove some of the
learning elements. If you if you could just say, hey, check up build me a robot that can do this. And it goes, Sure, here you go. Well, maybe you didn't learn the pieces in between?
It's a great question. And the way I like to think about it is that there is a tremendous amount of value in the learning process to expediency. Right? So in the case of robotics, the technology allows the learner to build more robots faster. You create a scenario where the learner is able to, I truly believe that they can actually in that scenario, also learn robotics
faster, right? So if I can, if I know nothing about robotics and I'm presented with a problem space, my first solution is probably going to be pretty bad. And every time I iterate on that solution, I'm going to learn a little bit more not only about how to solve that particular problem, but also just about robotics and engineering,
thinking in general, right. And so if the speed at which I'm able to cycle on those iterations is dramatically dialed up, as it is, in the case of software, and definitely would be in a software where if there's an AI assistant or a machine learning assistant, then I can iterate and thus, sort of learn about engineering design principles that much faster, all the time that I spent No, again, I don't want to poopoo the idea of building things with your hands or like, you know, working
with physical kits, even though they're inherently far slower, there are things that you can learn from that, that you can learn from, from software, but in terms of like the students cognition, the ability to rapidly iterate, as facilitated by the software, and eventually machine learning, definitely, I think will allow them to pick up those concepts that much faster.
It's kind of like, I mean, you see the debate, this debate happening, I don't know if there's a great analogy, but it sort of reminds me of E bikes, and I was in Tahoe a couple years ago, and I wanted to bike, I wanted to do some mountain biking in Tahoe, so I rented an E bike. And as you bike around Tahoe, on an E bike, you get a lot of dirty looks. Because it's sort of considered a cheat, right, just in the same way that I think Chad TPT is considered a
cheat right now. And yet, with that sort of electronically enhanced experience, in the short time that I had there, I was able to ride most of the trails in Tahoe, whereas if I had, you know, just been relying on my own physical inherent capabilities, I would have been able to see a fraction of what there was to see. So enhanced by the tool, I was able to, at the end of that experience, I was technically a more advanced Tahoe biker because I biked more
Tahoe trails. And I think it's the exact same thing with software based robotics.
I think that's a terrific analogy. And it applies to so many of the different discussions about AI right now. I mean, if you can give a fourth grader, the enhancements and augmentation tools to be able to create an incredibly sophisticated, convincing, beautifully written, you know, research paper, that is pretty amazing. And it probably will make that fourth grader incredibly excited about their potential, does it actually teach the research
skills inside it? Hard to say, but I think you could argue like you are here, I think that it almost allows the student to take the parts that might have been discouraging, or taking a really long time, and see what it's like to have them instantly or very, very quickly, which may enhance their interest in actually understanding it on a deeper level. How, how do I make an even stronger argument? How do I convince a different group of people? How do I, you know, research it in a totally
different way? How do I do you know, first person research? Like, I'm hoping and I think I do believe this, you know, we're all looking to the future, that that is true. And it won't be just seen as a cheat code, like you're saying,
yeah, it's in my mind, it's all about what the most high value and uniquely human thinking is, and what tools facilitate us to focus most of our time and energy on that part of the process. Right, like, if I don't think anybody like, if, for example, if you're writing a paper, and let's just say there's no AI assistant, but the words could appear on the piece of paper, as you thought that as opposed to having to take the time to write them with a pencil or even type them out
with a keyboard. If you do that faster, and you could write more as a result of having that technology, I think most people would argue that would be a positive thing, because you would spend more time and energy on the actual cognitive processes of thinking about the paper and thinking about your arguments as opposed to the manual, or administrative task of actually putting those words
onto a piece of paper. I mean, look like nobody thinks twice about the idea that some high powered executive is going to have an administrative assistant who schedules their meetings for them, because that's not really valuable work for them to be spending their thought cycles on and I don't think it's any different for, you know, a fifth grader like if we can give them sort of a proverbial administrative assistant to offload some of the tasks that are lower value in terms of the
cognition then if that accelerates the learning lesson, focus more time and energy on the on the things that are There are high value and high end things that will translate into their learning progression, then I'm all I'm 100% for it.
I agree with that. And it's a really interesting moment for that, because we've seen incremental increases, you know, spellcheck was that right spellcheck took it made it that students who would struggle with their spelling and would struggle with the poor adults, you know, who struggled with spelling and would have to focus on each word and making getting it right and then not be able to, you know, put together as complex thoughts because they'd be worried about their spelling or their grammar,
hey, it, suddenly you can read, you don't have to worry about that. And you can think about what you're actually trying to say. And I think this is sort of a societal lift of, of almost a different magnitude. Because if everybody has access to AI, to design robots to write papers to do their job, whatever it is, then what does being good at your job look like? It's really high level, it's some deep, deep thinking.
I think I remember the transition with calculators where there was a certain point where calculators were not allowed for the test, and then they were allowed for the test. And I think it's easy with this type of conversation to be to be reductionist about it and be like, Well, what happens if we don't teach the skills that live inside the calculator, and then if the student doesn't have a calculator, they, they can't do anything? Or they're helpless?
Or like, do they need the conceptual understandings as a foundation that are inside of that calculator, if we take that away, they lose that foundation. And I think that's fair, I think it's fair that there should be some amount of time spent on the things that the technology will ultimately accelerate, before allowing the technology to accelerate it, but not an undue amount, right. Like, that's not where we should spend most of
the time. And I do often find myself pushing back on the argument that students should be able to do all the things that we want them to do entirely unassisted, just in case they ever don't have those technologies at their disposal, because at this point, that's just not the more likely future to prepare them for right, like we have to prepare them for the future that we think is most likely and that is definitely a technology assisted future.
Definitely. I tend to agree with that as well.
I think some of those deeper, you know, sort of fundamental understandings actually do come up, if you are accelerating as fast as, as you want to, you know, if you're building a robot, through Roberto, whether it's in VR, which would be really fascinating, are you building it on a PC, and you have an artificial intelligence assistant and saying, oh, you know, you're gonna want to increase the size of this so that it has higher torque, or that it has a larger, longer
reach? It's not that you're just going like, Okay, do it. I don't even know what that means. Really, if you're engaged and people will be, you're like, Okay, wait more torque, what? Okay, so this means more torque, I literally mean, let me make sure I understand a little bit, at least a little bit about that as it goes. And then over time, more and more and more and, and you could even say, Hey, what is torque again, and the AI is gonna tell you what torque is.
It's like, sure, that is the future of what work is gonna look like it's a future with higher ed is going to look like at what professional engineering education is going to look like, why shouldn't we expose our younger students to that type of
power? Right? Yep, I totally agree. And I think that there's there's also sometimes maybe anxiety or fear about the idea that we lean too heavily into these tools. And then we sort of lose some of the beauty of the underlying, like, the simpler way of doing something. So let's take art, for example, like the the role of 2d artists that film and games is probably going to change significantly in the next decade, probably less, somebody just sitting down with a blank canvas and drawing
something from scratch. And more somebody working with AI generated images, and then modifying those images and knowing what sort of queries to make in order to successfully you know, get the images that they want from the AI. But I would definitely argue that there is still I hope that like sitting down with a blank canvas and drawing the old fashioned way never goes away. Right, even though professional practice at some point probably won't really
require that. So I can definitely see a future in which you know, education, still values of some of those underlying skills, even once they are, frankly entirely outmoded. Just because they're beautiful. I don't know what I hope that that remains the case.
Yeah, it's a really interesting, you know, avenue of discussion. I think it's going to come up for educators of all domains in different in different levels. A lot over the next few years is you know, if you can accelerate learning that much should you or is it is there a value in doing that step by step. One thing you mentioned about the Roblox game this this sports league is that It's not a single player experience. It's collaborative,
it can be competitive. I'm curious how you're thinking about collaboration in this era, like, what does it look like to collaborate or compete in that game? And how, what do you think that adds to the experience versus a single player?
Yeah, so I guess the first thing is, anytime we design an educational game, we tend to more toward collaborative designing collaborative mechanics and competitive mechanics, because there are very few people who don't like collaborative mechanics. But there are definitely people who don't like competitive mechanics. Competitive mechanics can work really well, for certain types of people. Obviously, there's all kinds of competition or society and sports and people. A lot of people thrive in those
types of environments. But by and large, it's just safer to build collaborative mechanics. And also, collaborative mechanics translate really well to, you know, how the world world actually works, right? Like we all, we all go to work and we collaborate with other people, even if we're at some level competing with another set of people at a different company
or whatever. Most of our day to day lived experiences, the experience of collaborating with colleagues, and so that we tend to tend to focus a little bit more on those types of mechanics that said, like a big part of what we're building with robocall sports league is modeled off of the FIRST Robotics methodology, which is essentially robotics as sport. And robotics as a sport requires, in many cases involves
some competitive scenarios. Now, first ethos has this, they have this value of competition, which is basically the people that you're competing with are also your friends and allies. And in some cases, they are literally your ally, sometimes the person you competed with in the last round, is now a teammate in this next round, because they'll pair teams together and combine their scores. So you don't have to work with somebody that were you were previously competing
against. So what you see when you go to a physical first competition is you see teams helping each other out, you see people, you just see just like a, an incredibly like friendly and collaborative atmosphere, even though at the end of the day, it is a competitive structure. So we try to bring that ethos into robot co sports
league as well. And then yeah, there are also just challenges that are straight up built around collaboration, there's a visible giveaway in an instant that we are a Wisconsin based game development studio, because there's a cheese packing scenario where you're building robots, to work with other work with your other players. In order to pack cheese as quickly and effectively as possible. It's actually quite fun.
I love hearing that phrase, cooperate Titian, I've got to get my head around that I love that. And it's such an interesting approach to sort of think about, you know, everybody in it together, but then there's sometimes there's competitive aspects inside it as
well. It's really inspiring actually, one of the things that is really exciting to me about this era of education is that we've been looking at, at AI and machine learning, we've been looking at all these advances that are happening as sort of, you know, the concept of personalized learning and things like that, as related to an
individual. And I think that realistically, there's going to be this incredible spawning, I hope of types of experiences that are both enhanced and augmented by, you know, incredible tools, like you're building with, with these robotics games, and artificial intelligence, you know, co pilots, but also with other people, with other real people who have opinions, and I really, you know, have ideas. And that just feels like something very
utopian to me. Like if you could truly have a group of students or a pair of students working together with AI enhancements to build something incredible to make a movie, change a law, you know, it feels very exciting. And I think it could be unbelievably empowering for this next generation, which is very
collaborative. I mean, you often see a lot of younger students working together, we talked about the loneliness and isolation, but there are a lot of projects where younger people get together and make incredible things happen. And with these additional tools, the incredible illness of those things is just almost like mind blowing, I think people are going to create things we can't even imagine now, students
Oh, totally agree. Yeah, one of one of the very first learning concepts that I learned about in grad school programming education technology was distributed cognition, the idea that you are at a given point in time, your cognition is partially inside of your head, and it's partially in the tools that surround you in the books and in the other people. And that the sum of all those things is greater than the collection
of individual parts. And I still think that's one of the most powerful learning concepts.
It is a very exciting future. I am choosing to stay very positive about everything in this world. Even though there are some people who are getting nervous about it. I'm still I'm really excited, I think we're gonna all have our minds blown at what this next generation of students can do
with given this toolkit. So, Dan, we could talk about this for hours and hours and hours, literally, I think there's so much to unpack here, coming on the end of our sort of our time, I always end the podcast with
two questions. One is, and I'm really, really curious, what is a trend that you see from your specific perspective heading filament games, 18 years of understanding game based education and, and its flow, what is a trend that you see coming that you think our listeners should keep an eye on?
This, I will relate back to the pandemic, I don't know if any of your listeners remember that. But there was this period, where everybody a lot of people were learning from home. And I think we were caught flat footed, in the education system, because software based or remote or digital based education was not even plan B, it was like Plan F. And I think through the process, after that experience, the perceived value of software and digital education, increased and
standing. And it's still not necessarily plan B. But I do feel like there was a greater emphasis placed on the value of digital tools also raised the quality expectations. And I think that was long overdue. And I hope that that trend continues now that the pandemic is mostly over, I guess we can say, in the same way that I hope you know, during the pandemic, people started riding bikes more, I hope that continues to I guess people also bought dogs and, and started baking bread, I don't
really care. So much of people keep doing that. But they're definitely some, some new perspectives, mindsets, and behaviors that became essential to success during the pandemic, that I that created a momentum that I hope continues. And that is one that I don't think we can go back to a world after that experience where people don't value software and digital learning anymore.
It's so interesting, because I think I'm hearing you say that it really resonates with me, the the pandemic sort of forced the whole world to slow down to stay inside, in many cases to sort of think about their lives and what's happening. And we lost a lot of people, which is obviously a big, you know, stunner for, you know, can be a life changing event for many
people. Yet, it also gave us a taste of the power of technology to you know, to really change systems that we didn't think, you know, were going to be changed that much that fast, including education, but I think other things as well, health, you know, I think health tech sped up like crazy because of
the pandemic as well. And it's really going to be interesting to see, I mean, I've been feeling personally this sort of Paul between wanting to keep that baking bread mentality that sort of slower, like appreciating the simple things in life. And then having these AI tools that are just so thrilling, you can make like the most amazing art you've ever seen. You know, I've been asking Chet up to write me stories to write like scripts, and then asking them to change it and do
this and do this. And I'm like, it's entertaining for me just to like, what it comes up with is, is fun. There's so many cool things you can do. It's a tension, I think there's a tension between the simplicity and sort of slowness of riding a bike versus, you know, zipping on a commute. And then the complexity and the, you know, the fact that tools are making things so fast. And so almost like science fiction, surreal in real life.
I love that there's an biking continuation of the biking theme throughout this episode. bikes and AI Yeah,
I have a friend who started biking during the pandemic, inside, sorry, got one of those, you know, amazing bike things that you can do races and collaborative things. But it's without leaving the house all on a stationary bike. And now the pandemic is over. He's, he's all about getting outside, but they're both there.
It's really interesting. So the final question is, what is a resource that you would recommend, or more than one that, you know, people who are really interested in going deeper and any of the topics we talked about could be game based learning, could be distributed cognition could be, you know, AI? Where would you recommend people look to sort of go deeper into some of these topics?
Yeah, this is an oldie but a goodie. I still love recommending James Paul, geez, what video games have to teach us about learning and literacy as sort of like a foundational introduction to the world of
game based learning? I can't remember when that book was published, but it's probably embarrassingly long ago, as a recommendation, but I still think it's just such a great primer for anybody who is interested in learning about the I think it's still very much relevant for anybody who's interested in learning about the underpinning principles of game
based learning. And of course, we know more now than than we did probably at the time, the book was written, but those principles haven't really changed, they're still as relevant as they, as they ever were. The reasons why game based learning are good games are a powerful tool for learning. Not so I think it's just a great place to, for anybody who is interested in going on that journey. I think it's a great
starting point. So like Kai Fuli is a I think it's called AI superpowers, which is, I categorize it in a similar vein as a primer, and maybe a little bit dated at this point. But again, a nice primer toward this whole sort of world of AI and machine learning and how that's going to be changing the workforce.
Yeah, fantastic. Yeah, students, just on a personal note that the James Paul G book, changed my life for sure. That book blew my mind when I read it. Again, embarrassingly long time ago, it made I went to graduate school for gaming and education. After reading that book. Yeah, I still use the concepts in it, this idea of nested goals, you know, they talk about in, you know, in Mario, you're trying to jump on
a Goomba. But you're also trying to get over this, get through the screen, but you're also trying to get through this level, but you're also trying to get through this world, and they're all happening at the same time. And it's an amazing, you know, metaphor for education. It's a phenomenal book, and then I have not read
the Chi Fuli. But I feel like we're these AI books that are coming out now are similar in that they are giving us a little bit of a map to what the world might look like in the next couple of decades or 100 years. Maybe it's a crazy moment,
which we certainly all need. We need as many. I mean, all the maps are wrong, but we need to, I need to look at them anyway, because that's the best we have right now.
signposts. They're like these wooden signposts sort of pointing in what you think is the right type of direction?
Exactly. Yeah, every single one, we should just come with the caveat that we should all just hold on to our butts at this point.
I've been reading a great book called The Big nine, about nine companies, six American and three Chinese companies that are affecting, you know, that are sort of building the AI world by Amy Webb, and she has three different scenarios of the future. It's like an optimistic, a practical and a catastrophic scenario of where this could all go. And I feel like that's a, it's probably a good way for us all to sort of picture the future. It's very open sliding
doors at this moment. As always, we'll put the links to the resources that Dan recommended in the show notes for this episode, along with the links to filament games, what they're doing with Roblox, everything we've talked about, you know, as much as so you can follow the thread. Dan White, this has been such a fascinating conversation. I just My mind is like a buzz. I hope our listeners are as well. Thanks so much for being here.
Yeah, absolutely. I've really enjoyed the conversation, I want to just to leave people on a positive note and maybe explain why I tend to be a technological optimist understanding. Of course, a lot of these technologies definitely have huge potential downsides.
There's a YouTube video, that is a TED talk, actually, a TED Talk by Steven Pinker, that basically looks at a variety of different metrics to ask the question, are things gradually improving over time are getting worse, and they will leave you with a lot of warm fuzzies I highly recommend that as a watch, you can add that to the resource list as
well. And I just, I feel like overall, the line of progress is not linear, that as we introduce new technologies, experiment with them make some mistakes, that gradually over time, we figure out how to use those technologies to serve the betterment of society, including education. So that's, that's a big part of why I remain an optimist.
I love that. Thank you so much. I feel the warm fuzzies after this conversation and ready to go into there as of today with a with a really open mind towards how this is all gonna play out. Thanks so much for being here. Dan. I hope to have you on the podcast again in the future.
Thank you. My pleasure.
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