Yá’át’ééh shik’éí dóó shidine’é. Hello my family and friends.

It has been a week since our beta release of Making Camp Navajo.

I’m so excited to tell you about how the first week went.

7 GENERATION GAMES MEETS THE EDHEADS SHOW: IT’S A #GOODSHOW

Last week on Making Camp Launch Day, I appeared on The EdHeads Show Baker’s Dozen Season Recap podcast with Dr. Dan Conn and Dr. Chelsie Hultz, who are professors at Minot State University in North Dakota. I had met them for the first time at AATC. (First off, let the teachers teach!) We also announced their Golden Apple Award winners. Congratulations, Teachers!

As a recap, our 7 Generation Games founders, Dr. AnnMaria De Mars, president and professor at National University, and Maria Burns Ortiz, CEO and New York Times bestselling author, also appeared on The EdHeads Show! Together they discussed the research, studies and statistics behind the 7 Generation Games math apps and curriculum. The interview also covered Growing Math, our new platform for free math games and digital resources that also offers paid teacher training.

The conversation explored the critical response revolving around gamified learning and edtech. How does gamified learning work? What makes an educational video game “fun” for kids?

“The reality is we live in a world where kids are on their devices, and so if you can give them good choices and good games and good ways to engage, that’s part of it. [Parents are] jaded because there’s a lot of games out there that are really bad.”

– Maria Burns Ortiz

Let’s give The EdHeads Show a shout-out of appreciation!

For The EdHeads Show podcast playlist, you can visit them on Facebook and hit up their website!

MAKING CAMP NAVAJO

I am currently compiling the list of Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts (ELA) and the Dine’ Content Standards to add to Making Camp Navajo.

In working on Making Camp Navajo, I felt one of the development challenges that stood out was having to narrow down our content for the math, agriculture and social studies game.

I wish we could have included everything our team had worked on. As is usually the case, it is always better to have more than enough content to work with.

Testing the game always takes so much time. Our dev team worked to polish the game mechanics and art. It always takes weeks to develop and release new versions of the game, mostly because we have other games that need attention. The dev team likens it to putting out fires here and there, especially as Launch Day drew closer.

More testing is always welcome, of course. Everyone on our team is always testing games in different environments (especially rural areas like Hawaii and the Navajo Nation) and circumstances. We always test and re-test new and existing games. If an element in the game does not work as expected or is not user-friendly, it could very well be a bug. That’s why testing is so important, in order to catch those bugs and fix them!

VOICE ACTING AND BILINGUAL VERSION

We released Making Camp Navajo in beta, but there is much more to add! The upcoming Navajo language translation will need our attention soon. We are preparing a Navajo language version of Making Camp Navajo that will follow with voice acting.

Yes, you read correctly. We are recruiting voice actors for Making Camp Navajo. You can ask for more information on getting involved at info@7generationgames.com.

FOLLOW OUR SOCIAL MEDIA!

We are @7GenGames on Twitter. You can check out our Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest.

Watch us on YouTube. Here’s our channels: 7 Generation Games, 7GenGamesTV, and Growing Math.

Our Spanish-language website is here!