Boardgames and Education

There is considerable emerging evidence about the benefits of board games in improving social, math and literacy skills. Games can be used to support learning in the classroom or in the home.

Material on this site

We have several teachers on the Committee of Boardgames Australia and we are keen to foster the use of games in the class room. We will set up a forum for teachers and others with an interest in education in the near future. Until then we have an edited transcript of the presentation by Steve Carroll at the Games & Education Forum at the Australian Games Expo in Albury 2008.  We also have the audio file from the full session featuring Steve Carroll and Giles Pritchard to listen to here (55MB).

We also have lists of games useful for improving literacy or improving numeracy.

Links to other web sites

• Games for educators has lots of resources for parents, teachers and librarians about the use of games in education.
• Teaching Strategies is a podcast run by Giles Pritchard and Tom Vasel (both teachers), on the use of games in schools.  topics covered include getting money for games programs, the value of games, good games for different curriculum areas and so forth.  you can find the feed here.
• a news report of how even very simple games have now been proven to improve maths skills in young children.
• On Boardgames is a podcast with occassional teacher orientated content.
• Kid Game Ratings collects reviews and information about children's games, from BoardGameGeek and directly from its users.
• BoardGameNews presents news about new boardgames and developments in boardgaming, as well as regular articles from a diverse range of contributors