Research on pilot runs of this project have been presented at the 2017 American Society of Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition and at the 2017 FabLearn Conference at Stanford. More information could be found at this website, and a prototype web-app of the game can be played here.

The MakerGames is a board game designed to leverage the power of make believe play and to spark thoughtful conversations about engineering concepts as students engage in open ended design challenges. With the four sides of the board split into a theme found in the traditional engineering design process, each tile has a unique prompt that either encourages storytelling to help frame the problem, brings attention to the material constraints in the building process, guides evaluation of prototypes, or facilitates sharing with marketing-type activities.

Using building materials as the reward for taking turns, the players roll a die to move their piece around the board every time the game clock lands on their team. Groups quickly discuss a prompt with the facilitator before they are allowed to take a limited amount of materials, then continue building their prototype while other teams take turns at the board. To finish the game, students are guided through a series of prompts in a similar manner to prepare them for presentations about their creation.