On March 3, Dr. Bobby Schweizer gave a presentation at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. Situated in the Education Summit, he addressed how to use Twitch as a pedagogical tool in the classroom to prompt students to vocalize their observations about a game’s design while they’re streaming video of themselves playing. Schweizer experimented with this method in his Game Design class this semester. Students’ experiences of recording a video helped them inform an essay assignment on their chosen game. This approach follows-up on his work with the EGL LIVE! research group in the Experimental Games Lab last semester.
Schweizer explains, “Twitch–the online service for broadcasting live gameplay footage that debuted in 2011–has proven wildly popular, as not only evidenced by its usage statistics, but also its integration into the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, and Amazon’s acquisition of the company in August of 2014. While much has been discussed about Twitch with regards to spectatorship and performance (particularly within e-sports) and issues of digital labor, little has been said about its potential as a reflective pedagogical tool.”
This presentation included an overview of broadcasting hardware and software, how to engage students of all types, productive frameworks, and lessons learned from attempting to use Twitch in the classroom.
