Instructor Insights

Instructor Insights pages are part of the OCW Educator initiative, which seeks to enhance the value of OCW for educators.

Course Overview

This page focuses on the course RES.3-003 Learn to Build Your Own Videogame with Unity Game Engine and Microsoft Kinect as it was taught by Kyle Keane and Andrew Ringler in IAP 2017.

This course was a 9-day hands-on workshop about designing, building, and publishing simple educational videogames. Participants learned about videogame creation using the Unity game engine, collaborative software development using GitHub, gesture handling using Microsoft Kinect, 3D digital object creation, videogame design, and small team management.

The course was offered during the Independent Activities Period (IAP), which is a special 4-week term at MIT that runs from the first week of January until the end of the month.

Course Outcomes

  • Learn fundamentals of videogame creation using the Unity game engine
  • Become familiar with collaborative software development using GitHub
  • Explore gesture handling using Microsoft Kinect
  • Learn about 3D digital object creation
  • Practice small team management skills
 

Instructor Insights

Technical skills take a long time to develop; you can’t turn people into developers in two weeks. But you can teach life skills in that time, so one of our goals for this experience is for participants to leave the workshop valuing themselves as learners.

— Kyle Keane and Andrew Ringler

Below, Kyle Keane and Andrew Ringler describe various aspects of how they teach RES.3-003 Learn to Build Your Own Videogame with Unity Game Engine and Microsoft Kinect.

Learn more! At the following Residential Digital Innovations page, you can learn more about how Dr. Keane and his team used the Microsoft Kinect as an educational tool.

 

Participant Insights

 

This workshop puts the responsibility for learning on the learner. The instructors set that expectation from the get-go.

— Abraham, Professional

 

Below, four participants in RES.3-003 Learn to Build Your Own Videogame with Unity Game Engine and Microsoft Kinect share their impressions of the workshop and offer advice to future participants.

 

Assessment

Grade Breakdown

There were no grades associated with this course.

The Classroom

  • Classroom with students sitting at moveable tablet desks arranged in small groups. Students are working on laptops.

    Room 1 of 1

    Workshop

    Workshop sessions were held in a classroom with small individual tables grouped together. A space with large moveable tables would be an ideal setup. Students had access to laptops or computers with Unity and GitHub installed.

 

Curriculum Information

Prerequisites

No previous experience with computer programming or videogame design required.

Requirements Satisfied

None

Offered

Offered periodically

Student Information

30 students took this course when it was offered in IAP 2017.

Breakdown by Year

Mostly undergraduates, some graduate students and professionals

Breakdown by Major

50% electrical engineering and computer science, 50% other, including business development

Typical Student Background

More than 50% of participants came to the workshop without prior digital design experience; about 30% had no prior computer programming experience.

 

How Student Time Was Spent

During an average week, students were expected to spend 3-12 hours on the course, roughly divided as follows:

In Class

3 hours per week
  • Met 5 times per week for 3 hours per session; 9 sessions total.
  • Workshop sessions were hands-on, with participants collaborating to build videogames using the Unity game engine.
 

Out of Class (Optional)

Optional

Some participants continued to work on their projects outside of class.

 

Semester Breakdown

WEEK M T W Th F
1 Workshop scheduled. Workshop scheduled. Workshop scheduled. Workshop scheduled. Workshop scheduled.
2 No classes throughout MIT. Workshop scheduled. Workshop scheduled. Workshop scheduled. Public exhibition scheduled.
3 No session scheduled. No session scheduled. No session scheduled. No session scheduled. No session scheduled.
4 No session scheduled. No session scheduled. No session scheduled. No session scheduled. No session scheduled.
Displays the color and pattern used on the preceding table to indicate dates when classes are not held at MIT. No classes throughout MIT
Displays the color used on the preceding table to indicate dates when workshops are held. Workshop
Displays the color used on the preceding table to indicate dates when no class session is scheduled. No class session scheduled
Displays the color used on the preceding table to indicate dates when public exhibition is held. Public exhibition