Immersed in History

(Photo courtesy of James Hung, and used with permission>)

"We want you...to experience history flowing around you," says Electric Funstuff Founder and CEO David Langendoen. 

And that's exactly what happens for middle-school students, as they play Mission: US.  But their experience will be unlike any online games--or any educational experiences--they've seen before.

With Mission: US, players find themselves virtually "living" the life of someone about their age--in a different time period.   Students can experience one of five historic periods. And they're learning about that time period in history even as they're having fun.

In each game, students take the role of an "everyday" person and make choices that will directly affect that character's future.   And their game experience outcomes differ, based on these decisions.

"For Crown Or Colony" depicts daily life just before the Boston Massacre.  "Flight to Freedom" takes players to a Kentucky plantation in 1848.  "A Cheyenne Odyssey" explores life as a member of the Plains tribe in 1866.  "City Of Immigrants" is set in New York City in 1907.   "Up From the Dust" presents life on a Texas family farm during the Great Depression.  And all of these resources are free to the educational community.

In 2019, Mission:US won both Teachers' Choice Award.  In addition, the first Mission:US experience, "For Crown Or Colony", won International Serious Play's Gold Award for K-12 Education.
And introducing...
Electric Funstuff continues to create new Mission: US experiences.  They've designed new episodes set during the Japanese-American internment of World War II.  Work is also just about to begin on a new episode that explores the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

But David and his staff are also introducing some new virtual-reality experiences.   Mission US TimeSnap, which they're designing for high-school history classes, takes students onsite to pivotal moments of history.  Once there, students inspect pieces of historical "evidence' to support their mission.

AND--TimeSnap, which is also free, will be available to educators for the 2020-2021 school year!
On this edition of Over Coffee®, you will hear;

What first interested David in history;

How he decided to combine his interest in history with his passion for roleplaying games;

The story of Mission:US ;

A closer look at the two new episodes of Mission:US, currently in the works;

What the creative process is like, for David and his Electric Funstuff team as they produce a game episodes with the goals of both educating and engaging students;

One of the most interesting experiences the team had, while working on the third episode in the series;

How teachers can use the episodes' strong storyteling to provoke discussions;

A look at TimeSnap, and how this experience takes high-school students "onsite" for history experiences through virtual reality;

The creative lesson which David has learned from his work designing both Mission:US and TimeSnap;

What's coming next!