Conclusions from Social Dynamics in Collaborative Environmental Didactics

Abstract

The social and didactic dynamics produced in implementations of the negotiation-oriented and partly web-based game “Surfing Global Change” (SGC) was analyzed by independent experts after their observations in advanced interdisciplinary university courses. It could be empirically demonstrated that the intended didactics of SGC were successful; namely that they were grounded on “active, self-organized learning”, training of “competence to act” and on responsibility for both practicable and sustainable solutions for the future society. The outlay of SGC succeeds in equilibrating competition vs. consensus, self-study vs. team work, sharpening the individual standpoint vs. readiness to compromise, differentiation into details vs. integration into a whole and hence mirrors professional realities. In this spirit, the architecture of SGC gives a framework for “game based learning” along its five interactive game levels. The conclusion is made that the set of game rules acts as a boundary condition for expected processes of social self-organization. The independent expert opinions express the importance of self-responsibility, for example when defining team size (ideally 3-5), during the identification of students with a project relevant to real life, and with the trainer staying on the meta level without entering into student discussions. Hence, self-organization in SGC allows for self-responsibility.