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Open data explained

This is a great animation from Inventorium describing how we can share and use government collected data. (Mild warning: you might find the narrator’s pronunciation of ‘data’ a bit irritating)

There’s more to play

As a teenager I spent lots of time in my garage designing and making boardgames. Highly elaborate fiendishly complex and virtually unplayable boardgames. The first computer game I designed from scratch was a simple town planning simulation. It was about 15 years ago and I built it to complement a theatre show for schoolchildren. Since […]

Educational games

Yesterday I spoke at BAF Games.  This is a summary of my ‘Play with Learning’ talk.  I have embedded links to supporting information into the post .  Sadly, I couldn’t capture the lively Q&A session afterwards. I made my first game as a young teenager – a board game so incomprehensibly complex and tedious, it only […]

Where should you post your status update?

The ease of connecting with the world through social media doesn’t always compensate for a lack of discernment. The proliferation of channels means that we are inundated with options but often ignore the choice not to post at all. This graphic from iStudio describes the decision tree beautifully.  

Developing business ideas

I have been running my own business for the best part of a year now.  In terms of the actual duration, it is only a few hundred days but in terms of experience it feels like a lifetime. One of the greatest pleasures about running Play with Learning is the flexibility it gives me to […]

Play & Games articles

There’s a lot of really interesting work going on with play and games – here are some of the articles that have caught my eye in the last couple weeks. Play Bring Back Play and Disorganized Sports to Our Children. From The Innovative Educator. http://j.mp/n8tCG3 ChicagoQuest promotes game-playing at school – Chicago Sun-Times http://j.mp/qU8zEk Parents’ […]

Satisfaction

I’m increasingly interested in what makes people happy. It’s pretty clear that it’s not material things such as money or possessions. Similarly, purely selfish behaviour doesn’t seem to lead to contentment either. When we are considering what we want to with our life it is crucial to keep this simple goal and these considerations in […]