School pupils across Aberdeen city and Aberdeenshire are being offered the chance to design, develop and market a game that will help bring to life the impact of climate change and how we can all contribute to combatting it.
Led by the University of Aberdeen Business School, the project will see one lucky group have their design promoted and potentially used to educate others.
Primary seven youngsters at Dunnottar School were the first to take part in the competition last week. They participated in a workshop looking at the issue of climate change, how organisations like the University are engaged in reducing emissions in their own operations as well as nurturing the next generation of green business leaders.
The pupils were then tasked with using their knowledge and understanding of climate change to design a game which could help educate others. They developed their networking and marketing skills to carry out some market research, discussed the importance that games have in developing skill sets and what makes a good game, then came up with their own ideas based on what would educate their chosen target audience.
The final challenge was to take part in a Dragon’s Den-style presentation showcasing their ideas to the ‘judges’.
Pam Cumming, schools’ engagement officer at the Business School, said: “With COP26 taking place in Scotland everyone is talking climate change. How can we save our planet?
“It was a privilege delivering this workshop to such enthusiastic young people. They engaged fully with the project and developed their employability skillset to create and present their ideas of a game that would educate others. From computer games or altering games already in existence to coming up with their own, the pupils certainly had very creative ideas.”
Sarah Reid, a teacher at Dunnottar Primary School, said: “Climate change is something as a class that we are passionate about. It was fantastic to be able to make the topic fun and educational and the class had a great time learning about the university and marketing, talking about games and coming up with their own ideas. An awareness of skill sets is important and the class developed their skill which will help them as they transition into secondary school.”
The workshop and competition are open to schools in primary and secondary level across the North-east. For further details contact p.cumming@abdn.ac.uk