Demonstrates how Serious Games can bring a subject to life for students

Afterlife Preparations is one of the ‘Serious Games Squared’ series – designed to demonstrate the benefits of Serious Games across different sectors.

Students often complain that history is boring.  Not when you bring it back to life!  The ancient Egyptians believed that mummifying a person's body after death was essential to ensure a safe passage to the afterlife. Over many centuries, they developed a method of preserving bodies so they would remain lifelike. The process included embalming the bodies and wrapping them in strips of linen. Today we call this process mummification.

Within this simulation, you will help the priest prepare the late Pharaoh for the afterlife.

Benefits to using serious games within the education sector:

• Serious games can stimulate enjoyment, motivation, and engage players.  Students actively want to explore the scenarios and learn more.
• They are proven to aid recall and information retrieval.  They also support the development of social, cognitive and problem-solving skills.
• They support several pedagogical approaches: learning by doing, learning from mistakes, goal-oriented learning, role playing, collaborative learning, and constructivist learning
• The features of a good game are the same as those of a good lesson: Focused and structured goals, well-defined rules, and providing challenging and clear tasks that enable participants to try new things without adverse consequences
• Serious Games and simulations are uniquely placed to provide outcomes and personalised feedback in real time
• Designed to promote students’ historical reasoning, foster cooperative learning and intellectual teamwork
• Most importantly, games can also be designed to appeal to and engage a wide variety of learning styles, recognizing the differentiation that occurs in classrooms.