Gameplan, the leading esports education and management platform, has launched four new courses to help students and teachers explore all the opportunities esports has to offer. The new courses are Esports Introduction, Game Development, Media Production, and Cybersecurity.
Esports Introduction provides a comprehensive foundation in esports and gaming, introducing students to a wide range of esports careers and areas of interest. The course is designed to transform students from passive consumers to active participants in esports by helping them develop a well-rounded understanding of the industry to prepare for informed spectating, active community involvement, and rewarding careers.
Game Development offers teachers a beginner-friendly course that promotes creativity, problem-solving, and design thinking as students learn to use industry-standard tools and skills to develop their own games.
Media Production and Cybersecurity empower educators—even those with no prior esports experience—to teach technically complex skills. The courses also provide students with skills and certification in these in-demand career fields.
The new courses were created by Gameplan’s content team in collaboration with education and esports leaders including Chris Aviles, founder of the Garden State Esports league, and Steven Isaacs, the education program manager at Epic Games, makers of Fortnite and other popular games.
Formats/platforms used:
Gameplan’s new courses are compatible with all internet-connected devices.
Primary website URL?
Problem solved:
Gameplan’s new curriculum is designed to enable teachers with no esports experience to lead engaging and rigorous courses in esports and related disciplines to provide students with a wide range of skills that are applicable to the esports industry and many others. The courses prepare students for college and careers while also helping schools to increase student engagement and reduce chronic absenteeism.
Grades/age range:
Gameplan’s Media Production, Cybersecurity, and Esports Introduction courses are designed for students in grades 6-12. Gameplan’s Game Development course is designed for students in grades 8-12.
Does your product address core/supplemental/special needs/extracurricular/professional development?
While the subject matter of the course is focused on esports, an extracurricular activity, they also teach students STEAM skills and prepare them for future careers.
Standards:
Each lesson in Gameplan’s courses is mapped to a number of different standards depending on the topics covered. Some examples include the ISTE Standards, the Next Generation Science Standards, career and technical education standards, and social emotional learning standards.
Lesson time needed:
Gameplan courses are usually a semester long with approximately 90 lessons divided into 5-10 units. Each lesson requires approximately 45 minutes of instruction.
Pricing model:
Pricing varies, but usually includes a site license fee for the Gameplan platform that includes any necessary integrations, plus a user seat fee that covers student use and curriculum. Partial and full district models are also available for systems with many sites or large student populations.
What makes Gameplan unique?
Gameplan’s courses are designed to be led by teachers with no esports experience, enabling schools to unlock the potential of this engaging, innovative, and growing area of education immediately without expensive training or hiring.
Characteristics
The user interface of the course is designed to be simple and intuitive so teachers can focus on sharing the exciting and engaging lessons with their students.
Courses on Gameplan are classroom-ready and the platform enables teachers to customize anything they want. They can pick lessons from different units to build a program order that fits their needs, they can edit any lesson material, and they can add or upload new material.
The interface is designed to work seamlessly with a teacher’s workflow, featuring integrations with the most popular learning management systems and student information systems, and lessons follow the common instructional design of “I do, we do, you do.”
Here’s what users are saying:
“The best way I could have imagined ending my teaching career is doing this.”
— Rebecca McIntyre, site technology specialist, Wichita Public Schools, Kan.
“When we look at the bigger ecosystem of esports, I really feel that Gameplan is integral in helping make it easy and simple for teachers to access, to use, and to work with their students and to teach their students about different aspects of esports as a whole.”
— Julie Mavrogeorge, CTE coordinator, Fresno Unified School District, Calif.
“For esports-related content delivery, Gameplan is unmatched in the industry.”
— James Rand, technology education teacher and esports coach, Griswold High School and Middle School, Conn.
