[music playing]

Speaker: OTAN, Outreach and Technical Assistance Network.

Robert Gomez: Hey, everybody. It's not that anyone could see me. So my name is Robert Gomez. I'm a HSE teacher, Salinas Adult School. We're over there by Monterey, off the 101. There's a pilot station there. It's very nice. So I'm sorry. So thank you for attending. And just really quick-- really quick story about resilience, about building resilience because this just happened to me, and thank goodness.

Most of you will probably be thankful that you are online. OK, so this is my first presentation. I'm not going to lie, real talk here, OK? This is my first presentation and I'm just busy. I'm trying to find coverage, full timer. I'm that rare unicorn. I'm a full time adult teacher, and finding sub coverage and doing the plans.

And I forgot to give the plans and I ended up co-teaching last night with the substitute online. And while I was polishing up my presentation, at the same time, well, anyway, through all this mess I'm thinking, I can finally relax guys. And then I go to find my luggage and I'm thinking, where's my luggage?

And I had left my clothes at home. So pretty much, I'm wearing the same clothes I wore yesterday. Don't worry, don't worry. Like I said, be thankful you're remote. Most of you guys are remote, but it's talking about resilience, it's amazing what some imagination a bathtub full of soapy water and a blow dryer in the hotel room will accomplish in a short amount of time, OK?

So, the resilience. How can you build that-- I'm thinking, oh my gosh, and I feel pretty good about myself. All right, I did pretty well. I'm going to go to Target after all this today and get myself a wardrobe, but I'm thinking that was pretty resilient. There's just-- there was something there, and how can we build that kind of resilience in our students, right?

So part of the way we can do this is getting the story, right? Think of-- first of all, a quick survey. And you guys at home, you probably saw the video game thing and you might be a gamer, and I'm-- hopefully, you guys are. So how many have you been playing some video game during the workshops?

I'm just wondering, and you can just give me a thumbs up or whatever. I've been playing Pokemon Go off and on because this is a new place and there's some new gyms, and whatnot. Yes, yes, yes, yes, OK, awesome. Thank you, right? That's great.

I'm a dyed-in-the-wool gamer since-- I'm 48 years old I've been playing video games since I was five years old-- four years old, and with the Atari VCS or 2600, right? So I go all the way back to that, right? So how many of you guys, though, got interested in educational technology, or technology in general because it's video game adjacent?

Because we're next to the things that we like anyway. I'm just wondering because you still get to play with the toys, right? You're at work but you still get the cool toys. I know I get to use the Owl. What about you guys, right? Maybe? Oh, no. This is the reason why I asked this, because I went to a Google-- a Google boot camp, right? Google-certified educator boot camp, right?

Almost everybody in there was saying, "Hello, my name is [inaudible name]. I'm a gamer." And that was about 75% of the people in the room. As a matter of fact, one of the teachers there that I met was a co-worker. I hadn't seen him in about 15 years since about 2000, and I had worked with him at a San Jose FuncoLand. That was GameStop, right? That's what GameStop is now, but it was FuncoLand.

I hadn't seen the guy in 15 years but yeah, and he's there too, and I know he was a gamer, right? So that happens, right? Here, it's in us, right? I mean, and real talk. I mean, yeah. That's why I took it. I get to play with the toys. There's nothing wrong with that, right? To be honest with ourselves, right?

But let's take a step back, though, before we get into video games. And we're going to talk about what is play, right? My community college instructor-- because I barely graduated from high school. And I went through community college. I had taken a lot of remedial classes, worked my way up.

And the instructor, my college for math for non-majors instructor was telling me, "You shouldn't teach high school." "Really?" He said, "Yeah, you can do what I do." I said, "Really?" "Yeah. When I'm here, I feel like I'm playing. I'm playing with you guys." He's a math instructor. So he found the game-- he found the game in what he did, or at least he found a sense of play in what he did.

I'm just hanging out with you guys, and I'm just playing. I said, "Wow, that's really cool." And then I started or thinking, OK, maybe I should pursue my master's, right? So that's a big pivot point in my life. But what is play? What is that feeling we get, right? Well, so there's this word, historical and culturalist, Johan Huizinga, right?

He came up with this idea of Homo Ludens, which is the man that plays, that we play, we play. That's what we do, right? We play. Well, once again, if anyone wants to stop me, if anyone has any questions, let me know. I'm OK with that. That's how I run my class too. I said-- I tell my classes, "If you have a great question, I'll stop. I'll put it on the board because if you're stuck and someone else is stuck, if it's an excellent question, I'll turn it into a lesson later on, right? That's what I said, OK?

And, well, what's play? Well, it's free. It shouldn't have to cost you anything, right? Just play. I'm not talking about video games, just play in general, right? If I have this bottle right here and I just-- I can make a game out of it. People flip bottles, right? They take their empty bottles and they start playing a flipping game. I'm sure you've seen it before. And there's no rule. It's free, for the most part, unless you pay for the water bottle, right?

It's out of ordinary daily life. It's not your work a day, it's not driving to work. It's temporary, right? It's temporary. And in that, it creates an in-between space called a liminal space. Victor Turner, who's an anthropologist, calls a liminal space. And I'm not talking about the backrooms liminal space or empty mall corridor liminal space. They're related, right?

But talking more that in-between place. Adolescence is that in-between place, right? When people are graduating from high school and they're walking across the stage, right? It's that in-between place between where you started and where you finished, right? And adolescence is like that so passages, right? Things like that, that's called a limited-- liminal space.

And play happens there. We create a space, right, that is a bubble outside of our everyday life, right? It creates order. It creates rules. It creates conditions because I'm going to play with this water bottle, right? And pretty soon, I'm going to make up rules. OK, if I could flip this water bottle and it ends up on the cap, I win, right? So it creates order. It creates rules.

Because if you're dealing with more than one participant, right, you got to play nice, right? You guys got to play nice. You can't cheat, right? You got to play along or else the game doesn't happen, the play doesn't happen, right? So it creates orders, conditions, rules, boundaries. It's necessary for a play community, right?

Even if it's just a couple of kids on a schoolyard jungle gym pretending that it's a pirate ship, they all got to buy into that, right? Said, "The person that wants to play space ship, you're out of luck. You're going to have to play pirate, OK, if you want to play, right?" And also, play, it's not for making money. Once again, I can start doing this and it's-- I'm not making money, it's just playing. It's, intrinsically, not materially profitable, right? It should-- that's what it should feel like when we play, all right guys?

But, eventually, that play turns into something more formalized. It turns into a game, right? Jesper Juul who's a writer, he's a columnist but game studies professor. He says, "It's, basically, a rule-based system with variable and quantifiable outcomes." Basically, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. It can be measured, right? Different outcomes are assigned different values. Usually, it's win, lose, right?

The player exerts effort in order to influence the outcome. There is an effort to make that-- to change the outcome, right? The player feels emotionally attached. That's important, guys. Think about that. Think about a student that you have, right, that had-- really pours their heart into something and really starts really getting involved with an assignment or a project. It becomes personal to them, right?

There's some kind of emotional attachment that maybe wasn't there before, right? So this space, this liminal space is created. And the consequences of the activity are negotiable, right? It can change-- it can change, right?

Chess, let's talk about a seemingly simple game, guys. Chess is a perfect example, right? It's got a system of rules. Now, I do have the long version on this side of the screen, I have the short version here. So whatever you are feeling guys, so on this side of the screen, I have the long version. I have this-- I'll give you a moment to digest that for a second.

My dad taught me how to play chess when I was five years old. He needed someone to play with so he taught his kids how to play, right? So it's a perfect example, OK? Jesper Juul says that it's got a system of rules. There's an outcome. It's you win, you lose. It takes effort, investment. Have you seen chess tournaments? Have you seen what happens when people win or lose?

Some people will just pound and just storm away, right? And there's an investment. The consequences are negotiable, meaning that they may have real life implications, or they might not, right? Sometimes, play is just play. But sometimes, playing means something. It might be your career. They feel like you're an athlete or you're a professional chess player, right? It's money.

Also, guess what? Chess, it doesn't look like it, but it tells a story with emotions attached. I know. What's emotional about this, right? You have this chess piece, what-- doesn't really scream high drama, OK? It really doesn't. But it does tell a story, guys. Actually, there is a dramatic story there. We love drama. We love stories, OK? We love stories. We love stories. We're story makers as people, OK?

The player feels emotionally attached to the outcome. Chess is perfect because it tells the story in both the simple dramatic conflicts. It's a very representational. You have one army here, you have one army here. They're locked in deadly combat, right? You have knights, and bishops, and pawns, and they're on the battlefield. And whoever wins takes the kingdom. And that's what it's representing, right?

And, of course, there's this meta narrative on the outside, that we stand outside. We look and we say, "Hey, wow. This is really-- I'm watching these two chess players and they're just really intense, right? And we give that meaning, right? We give that meaning from the perspective of, well, especially if you're a gambler and you're betting on that particular chess match. It happens. I mean, if there's a competition, people will bet on it, right?

But games create that dramatic action, right? Dramatic action happens when you have a protagonist, right? And you have something that's getting in the way of the protagonist's goal that creates conflict, right? And our students face that every day, right? It might be an external conflict. It might be someone else. It might be society. It might be the economy. But, right, they face that.

However, games create that dramatic action too. The idea here, though, is to try to find it in your course, right? So what is dramatic action? Well, pretty much, it's not shootouts and gunfights, right? It's not John Wick, it's not whatever. According to-- these people are theater people, OK? These are dramatists. Aristotle, he's a guy. And he wrote some things.

And basically, they're saying dramatic action is when something or someone makes something happen. That's it. And then there's a chain of events, right? It's a process of causal events and reactions. People make that happen, by the way, often times, right? Through our motivations, through our wants, our needs, or desires.

Now, think about your student real quick. Think about one of your students, right? That's your hero. That's your hero. They're the hero in their own adventure and they take that first step, right? And when they first take that step, when they walk through that door, when they register, when they fill out that form, when they take the courses, right, a series of actions and reactions will follow in their personal lives and your life, right?

The actor becomes a protagonist in the story. They become the hero in their own story. And figuratively-- literally, sometimes, there are stakes here, right? And however, if the protagonist, and especially in a video game and in life, doesn't have a guide early on to mentor, train, and educate, they can get overwhelmed, right?

They get confused. They can be the loser in this narrative. And what is losing? They quit. That's the losing. It's not the failure part because we can learn from that, it's when they quit. It's when the attrition, that's-- the attrition part, right? They don't come back because of a lot of those factors, right?

So, the dungeon becomes a classroom and vice versa, right? When I talk about the dungeon, I'm talking about where the monsters are, right? Where the traps are, where all the obstacles are, right? An educator, let's see you guys and me, and a rule system must create a narrative environment, create a place where those stories can happen, right? Where the aspirant learner can acquire and master the skills that will build on each other.

Now, video games, this one to get to the video game part, have been teaching through narrative environments for years. Wordless, effort-- seemingly effortless. Let's take a look at this. This is one of the most famous levels in gaming. Yeah, this is Super Mario Brothers World 1-1. And take a look at this. Wordlessly, our protagonist moves through this level, and everybody's got a different way of doing it. It depends how quickly you want to get through it, right?

You can take shortcuts, you can take the long way, right? But there's a couple of things that you learn here, right? One, you can only move forward, OK? Two, you can't go back. Three, you touch that thing and you die, OK? You touch that thing and you get big, right? And of course, at the end, you see this pit and you think, OK, you don't fall in that. Bad things will happen, right? And it teaches that basic-- the basics of the environment, the things that they're going to need as they move forward to more complex things, right?

So that's the amazing thing I like about games. I mean, is-- especially gaming environments, right? Because what's happening is, as they learn through the scenery, right-- James Paul G. calls-- it's the trajectory, it's the path, OK, through which they navigate the system, they navigate the rules, right, and the architecture, right?

You're maneuvering and you think, OK, I can't fall in here, right? So that's going to change your trajectory. That's going to change your pathway, right? Just like your student, right, is going to learn how to navigate, right, or your learner. And they'll education business, right? The player, your students, and the games designers, you, the curriculum designers, you come together-- you can come together to play a game, right?

You can come together and play a game. It's got complex rules, right, that you have to follow and your learner has to follow, but this is where the learning happens, right, as they navigate through this space, as they navigate through these systems. This is the space where your learners become heroes in their own story.

OK, the part of the way we do that is creating this feedback loop. We're going to take a look at this. This is from a later game called Metroid that takes some of the Super Mario stuff and builds on it. And this is courtesy of Jeremy Parish who's a journalist.

[video playback]

- The exploration, the character growth, the constant acquisition of better gear with which to perform ever greater feats. What sets Metroid apart is the fact that all of these mechanisms are one and the same thing. Samus herself is both heroine, weapon, and tool. As Samus explorers, she grows in power by collecting the gear upgrades she finds along the way. And as she gains upgrades, she also increases her ability to explore the underground passages of Planet Zebes. The more she explores, the more she becomes able to explore further. It's a simple feedback loop, but a profoundly addictive one.

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Robert Gomez: Right, so as a character becomes more powerful, the more they can explore and gain more power. That's your learners. The more they learn, the more powerful they get. And so-- and once they get powerful, they can see-- hopefully, they'll see how powerful they have become. They can look back and go, oh wow, well, I want more. I want to do more. And so we create that feedback loop, right?

But how do we do that? It can be done. Games do it all the time, but how can it be done? Well, part of the way we do this is through gaming. Well, one of the ways we can do this is through gaming. There's many ways. But in the scope of this talk, gaming. We're going to talk about this.

[video playback]

- Indeed, Metroid seems designed to build off the player's familiarity with Super Mario Brothers. As I've written about before, the game begins by giving the impression of a standard side scrolling action platformer. As in Super Mario Brothers, Rush'n Attack, and even Rygar, you begin by running left to right, avoiding and destroying enemies along the way. You could only make it so far this way before you come to a seeming dead end.

In the third room over, Samus encounters a low hanging wall leaving only a gap too small to walk beneath. Any assaulters would have encountered a similar structure in World 1-1, 2 of Super Mario Brothers, so similar, in fact, it's hard to believe that the Metroid team wasn't inspired by that game. But where Mario could either run beneath the gap while in his unpowered form, or shatter the bricks above it to create a path, or perform a running slide beneath it by ducking, Samus has none of these options.

She can only run, jump, and shoot, and neither of these will get her past the obstacle. Instead, you're forced to backtrack to the opposite side of the initial starting point, where a power up awaits just beyond the initial screen in the wrong scrolling direction. The placement of the item forces you to come to terms with the fact that you're going to be playing this game differently than you did Mario, which was an adventure that wouldn't even allow the screen to scroll backward.

Even Kid Icarus used that style of ratchet scrolling throughout, meaning Metroid works like Kid Icarus' dungeon stages, but with the free scrolling of Mario. Anyway, this item hidden on the opposite side of the starting point is called the Maru Mari, and it allows Samus to duck, like Mario for whom it probably isn't named.

Unlike Mario, Samus turns into a rolling ball when she ducks. In ball form, she can roll freely through the world. Ducking into a ball allows you to slip through narrow passages, and it also puts Samus in a standby status that allows her to drop explosive bombs. Once she's added bombs to her arsenal, of course. Bombs work as both weapons, capable of damaging foes, and as tools that can shatter certain tiles in the floor and wall, revealing new passageways.

[end playback]

Robert Gomez: OK, so once again, without a manual, right, and without anybody to bark in your-- video games, right, these days, they hold your hand. They'll tell you how to do everything. But this game, through its environment, right, through its embedded rule sets, right, tells you how to play it, right? And it does that by gating. Samus cannot get past a certain point without becoming a ball, but you don't know that from-- you figure, "Oh, I must have missed something."

So you go back and you think, "Oh my gosh, I can go back in this game. This is different than Super Mario Brothers. I can actually go back." And then, you find this thing that makes you turn into a ball and now you learned a skill. You learn a skill, right? The environment taught you, "Hey, if I turn into a ball, now I can do more things, right?" And that's what gating is. You have to learn how to do something before you move on. I know it sounds simple, but we need to embed that without making it gating, right? Gating, right?

So let's take a look. So in your lab curriculum, right, how can we gate this, right? How can we create this feedback loop? How can we gate this? Well, we do this by controlling the flow of material, OK? Assuming the adult learner is your protagonist, right, we as the designer of the curriculum, of the course, we can-- one, we can initially limit the number of choices or options the learner has.

If the learner has too many courses open in Burlington English, or Aztec, or USA learners, they're going to get overwhelmed. They're going to get confused, and they're not going to be able to focus on just one or two things, right? We want to limit those choices, right? Now, once they get it, once they learn the system, once they learn the basics, right, once they learn how to use a computer, in some cases, right, that's a gate sometimes.

You can open up a wider number of options when the learner has mastered some things, right? And then, as the student-- so we start narrow. We open up. And then when they get to the end, right, whether that be finishing your course, getting their certificate, graduating, getting their high school equivalency, then we narrow it down again for the-- just focused on crossing the finish line, right? So we control the flow, we gate things, OK?

So by doing this, we can create the feedback loop and focus and persistence that gamers find all the time, right, when we design it. And you're thinking, "Well, how do I do that?" Well, I've done it, but I'm going to show you a really big example here. So this is a case number one, right? This is a video-- first, I'm going to show you a video game case, and then I'm going to show you a case from something I did a few years back, OK?

So this is a game called Knights of the Old Republic. It's from 2003. It was developed by BioWare. So this is a role playing game. This is a role playing game like Dungeons and Dragons, you may have heard of it. But here, the D&D stuff, all the dice rolling, all the stat keeping, that's hidden. The computer-- the software takes care of that for you, right?

Everything was turn-based. And you follow this story where you're stopping the Sith Armada-- I know it sounds silly when I say it, from taking over the galaxy, right? There's numerous stories and side quests. There's several playable allies, right? You create your own protagonist. You create your own protagonist, right? And you choose, are you going to be on the light side? You're going to be a good guy? Dark side, you're going to be a bad guy?

You choose your trajectory. You choose your path through this, right? Your character grows. They get stronger depending on what side they go on. Also, your character has amnesia, getting that dramatic action in there, very soap opera, right? You quest for your own personal data, but that's our learner. It is a quest for personal identity, right? We're trying to-- they're trying to figure out, "Who are we, right? Where do we fit in this world, right?" And creating a game space, a narrative environment, safe one, right, in your classroom, that's where they can find that out, OK?

Let me show you how this looks as a diagram. So once again, this is the story, right? This is the story as it is. We have-- this is our KOTOR model, this Knights of the Old Republic. Now, if you look at-- we're going to look at a dramatic narrative three-act structure, OK? Act 1, we have limited choices. Your character is only bound to one environment. That's where you learn the rules, you learn the basics.

And once you get that, there's an inciting incident where that planet gets blown up, OK? And you can't go back. That's it. And then once that happens, all these choices, all these planets are now available for you to grow and explore. And get your skills up, right? This is act 2 in the dramatic structure. This is when the character has the most choices. They can be the good guy. They can decide to be a good guy, they decide to be a bad guy. Who are they going to be at the end of this?

And then, finally, you get to a point where it narrows again in act 3, right? That's when you have the least amount of choices. This is the climax, the resolution of the story, but the protagonist is now focused on the end goal, right? All your earned skills are put to the test. That's your assessment.

So the outcomes are simple. It's win or lose. You achieve the main goal in the story in this game or you quit. There's no game over in this game. You either finish it out or you quit. That's it. That's it, right? And the same thing goes for our learners, right? They either finish the game or they quit, right? Well, we don't want that. But notice, there's gates here. There's gates here at the top, there's gates here at the bottom, right? And we can control that.

Case number 2, the Burlington English lab. This was-- so I did this. I piloted this a few years back. Flex model of blended learning, not HyFlex. This is different. So this is a blended learning-- blended learning model. This is Flex. This was all in person, OK? So pretty much, the class consisted, of course, our Burlington English licenses.

50% of the class was independent study language acquisition. So students would-- I would assess them, right, using Burlington's assessment tool. Of course, I would go by their course scores and of course, I would talk to them. And I'd figure out, OK, where do they need to be? And that's where I would put them. And so part of the class, they're learning at their own pace, OK? They're going through the grammar, the speaking, and the listening parts, right?

And if you use USA Learns, or Burlington English, or something like that, you've probably seen that before. Teacher, during this point-- OK, the teacher acts as support, monitor, case manager, because we are managing cases, right? And then, the other 50% is spent on EL Civics teacher-led instruction, right? So that-- there's our group teacher-led instruction for EL Civics, right? But this gives--

So there's benefits to this, OK? And I ran this. I ran this program for a good year, right? So I piloted this for a year and wrote down what I learned from this experience, OK? Anyway, so this is how the class would work, at least the first 50%, OK? So this is based on Burlington English's Everyday English. Now, for those of you who have come into Burlington English a little bit later, this is back in-- before 2019, I believe, or yeah, when Burlington English was an actual software that you had to install on the computer, OK? And it wasn't online yet.

So students would start the module, right? Now, they would do the lesson, which back then was known as a situation. Now, there is two parts to that situation. There was a part A, there was a part B. They can spend as much time with that as they want, OK? Now, this is where the gate comes in, OK? To reinforce that learning and also to check, the students would also be assigned a worksheet that they would have to hold on to.

They would have to collect all their work in a binder, right? So they'd have to create a portfolio of their work, so that's worksheets and assessments, right? Teacher will have to grade and check that personally. Sit down with them one on one, right? And if they're having problems, that's where one of the places where the teacher can sit down, work with them if they're stuck, right, through whatever topic they're having problem with.

And then once they work through the situation, and they're finished with the worksheet, and it looks really good, and if they don't need any additional support-- if they need additional support, they're going to stay there. For me, I would pull something from All Things Grammar, or from one of my books, or from Stand Out, or whatever I needed to do to support them in this part of their journey, OK?

So think of this as a space, though. Don't just think of this as a pathway, think of this-- this is their dungeon, right? This is their level, right? And finally, once they acquired those skills, once they powered up, then there's the boss right there. There's the boss of the level. That's their, I guess, formative in some ways because it's just for the situation. In some ways, it's cumulative assessment, and they have to pass with a 70% or more.

And if they do that, then and only then will I open up the next module to them. Because in some applications, depends on what you're using. Even if you're not using an application, you can do this too with your books. You can say, "OK, it looks like you're ready to move on." Some people-- and this is the great thing, because some people are ready to move on and they'll move on. Some people need more remediation. They'll just-- they'll stay behind and they'll do what they got to do to get there, right?

So everyone's moving at their own rate. Why? Because we controlled the flow of the material. You can do that in Burlington, and you can do that in Aztec, and you can do that in a couple of learning systems like that, OK? OK, so any questions here? Any questions here as far as this is concerned? So just pausing right here, because it did a lot of talking but now, I'm at the point where I actually put this to work.

OK, here we go. So these are my results. This is based on just empirical observation, mostly. As a teacher, I was able to individualize learner programming, meaning I was able to tailor it to their needs-- their own personal needs. Tardy learners, I live in an area that is mostly agriculturally-based, or-- well, I teach in an area that's agriculturally-based.

I work in the Salinas Valley. So most of my ESL students were-- well, because I'm HSE now but I was an ESL teacher for nine years, and a lot of them were farm workers, right? And I would get people coming in late. That looks pretty normal, but you ever experience that? You have people coming in tardy and you already started your lesson, you're about a half hour into your lesson and you're thinking, oh my gosh, I don't want to have to do this again.

But I didn't have to worry about that because at the first half of the class, everyone was studying independently. I was working one-on-one in a tutorial capacity, that the people who needed it. And the people who came in late, they just got to work. They knew what to do once they learned the system, once they learned the rules, right?

So I was able to work with a one-on-one. Even in big classrooms, I was actually able to work with them one on one. So adult learning, we can assess it formatively through checks, and we can communicatively assess it. Students-- this is the crazy thing, guys, and I'm going to tell you this right now, and I've waited years to share this with you.

Student takes ownership of their learning and they develop persistence, and I've seen this. So one of the things they have to do, they have to keep their worksheets and their tests in the portfolio so I can check it and they can share it with me. It tracks their progress, right? Plus, they take ownership of what they're doing. Learner can observe their progress. They can see how strong they're getting. They can actually look back and say, "Oh, wow, this stuff is easy now. Look at the stuff I'm doing now. That's way harder but look at the beginning of my binder."

So I'm a big paper person, too. I like paper and pencil, just as much as I love computers and video games. They can look back and say, "Wow, I've learned a lot," so they feel their power. They feel that growth and that builds persistence, that builds that loop. Craziest thing that happened once I was further into the course, people were asking to take home homework.

In ESL, that is-- especially where I live, that's amazing, because that was the only time in my nine years of teaching ESL all levels, beginning, advanced, intermediate, that I had people asking me, "Hey, can I have a worksheet? I'd like to take it home, work it on-- work on it over the weekend." Wow, they found the game. They found the game in this. They learned the rule system, they found the game, they wanted to participate, right? And so that's never happened since then, since I had that particular model.

I'm in HSE so people study no matter what. I'm a high school equivalency teacher now. They will study in America because they have intrinsic motivation, but ESL, that's a different game. But that's just the best thing to happen, that was a gift, OK?

So, some thoughts on the future. I'm an HSE teacher, so this is a work in progress. This is all-- this is based in research that I did. This is based in graduate research I did in 2010, and it's still a work in progress, and it's still ongoing. Some things, I'm thinking about now is because I'm an HSE teacher how can I design this to create a similar feedback loop? I teach HyFlex. I teach HyFlex now morning and evening.

I use Canvas and I use Aztec Learning. How can I use gates and a similar approach, right? And can I-- will I be able to narrow and then widen, and narrow again as they get closer-- as they pass more and more high sets of exams, right? And the cool thing is, I try to make it a game. I'm starting to find the game because I tell my students, "Hey, the more of these you pass, the less of me you have to see, right?"

Because it's-- if you-- I teach one topic per day. And I say, "You don't-- you pass science, you don't have to come in on science day anymore. You don't have to worry about that, right?" So that's part of the game, right? You feel yourself getting stronger because you don't need to see me as much. That's where I'm starting here, OK?

Now, the other thing-- consideration to make is distancing finding the game from gamification. Gamification is way different. I'm not a big fan of it. Gamification is, basically, where you're taking something like work or study, and you're giving extreme-- extrinsic, meaning outside, rewards, points or whatever that don't really matter, versus intrinsic motivation for adults, right?

It's got to come-- with our adults, it's got to come from inside, right? You can't just give someone points and say, "OK, well, here you go." Right? So finding that game is finding that motivation from the inside to finish the game. My moon shot here going forward, sometime in the future, is creating an actual game based on existing game creation platforms such as using GameMaker or RPG Maker, one of those, and make it for mobile.

I'd love to have a high set course embedded in an actual game, where in order to get through it, they have to understand the science. That's my moon shot. So there we go. So that's my thoughts on the future. So, find the game in what you're doing. Do you feel like when you go in there and you're with your students?

With my college instructor, you feel like, yeah, I'm not really working. Of course, it's work. It's always work. But at the same time, you feel like you're playing with your students. And if you feel like you're playing a game with your students, that you made, then maybe you found the game, right? There you go. So thank you for your time, OK?

So there's my email if anyone's interested in picking my brain a little bit more on this, I am a Canvas lead. I'm an administrator at my school. I'm also the de facto educational technologist and Burlington English person. So if anybody wants to pick my brain about that too, you're more than welcome to.

My personal gaming blog, which sorely needs to be updated, is-- that's my URL right there, where I try to make a more personal connection between the emotion human, what's happening inside, to video games, how some of us can make a very personal connection to video games because there's an emotional connection, OK? So thank you.

Also, if you want to take some quick photos, there's my research. So this is my sources. So if-- for those of you at home, whenever you want to pick up on some of that that I threw out there, especially the anthropological things, you totally can.

And then, here's the other one. There's the YouTube video. It's a really great series that I found that from-- so if you want to take a screenshot of that. And of course, send your evaluations. Hey, Mr. Gomez, talk too much, and that's OK because I do that. OK, so that's it, guys. Thank you guys for coming.