High-Level Project Summary
The revolutionary mission of NASA which dared to explore the unexplored i.e. to touch the sun was indeed a proud moment for all humans. This mission has great importance which has to be shared among all audiences, especially the younger ones. So there is nothing more engaging than game-based learning. The main idea of our project was to deliver the journey experience of solar parked probe from its building stage to its current state through interactive games. The three-level game followed by a short quiz will assess the knowledge of the learner. Post quiz, the learner/player will receive a rewarding certificate.
Link to Final Project
Link to Project "Demo"
Detailed Project Description
Our project is a game-based learning approach. So understood the entire mission and fragmented it into different parts and began to do rapid research on what games could be chosen to explain it in a better way. Finally, we were able to map simple games to parts of the mission.
Finding the right technology to develop our prototype was the next challenge we faced after the idea formation.
We checked different tools that could be utilized to create games, gdevelop is one such tool that helps any beginner to create games. So we came up with 3 games :
- Jigsaw puzzle - To understand the design and structure of the probe
- Connecting the dots- To understand the trajectory followed by the probe
- Driving through the solar wind- To understand how the parker moves in the trajectory and reaches the sun.
Finally, as an assessment to check the knowledge gained by the player, we designed a short quiz. Once he qualifies in the quiz with 70 % marks, he is eligible for a digital certificate. Hence employing this kind of model, we felt it would balance both fun and knowledge. This game is very simple and it can be played by kids starting from 10 years old to senior citizens. Hence it provides an opportunity for all types of audiences to better understand about parker solar probe.
Also the resources provided in the resource section was very much helpful while designing the prototype.
Although we planned a lot to make it even more engaging and thrilling by incorporating AR technology. Hence at this stage, we consider that as the future scope of our project.
Kindly note that we have given separate links for each level and a separate link for quiz.
Space Agency Data
The resources provided on the challenge page gave us brief insights of the mission and its significance. Since designing the games that represent the true event requires a lot of research and data. So we started hunting for them, when we got a good understanding of the mission, we were thunderstruck by the amazing work done by the scientist and technicians at NASA. The main knowledge hub was the information section about parker solar probe in the NASA website. Also, the probe design and instruments incorporated in it to study the sun were really enlightening to learn. So to design the game, we collected different articles, blog posts and Wikipedia pages about the mission and what discoveries it made in its journey.
We also referred to many videos for better understanding. Since one of the levels of our game involves the trajectory of the probe, we had to find various bits of information regarding the trajectory data. Once the mission is completed, humanity will hopefully get answers to one of the biggest unsolved mysteries about the energy of the sun.
Hackathon Journey
The two-day journey of this massive hackathon was an amazing experience. We never thought we would reach the end line to share our experience. My entire team would like to salute the all scientists and technicians who worked Solar parker Probe and made the impossible happen. The question of whether is it possible to touch the sun made us look into the challenge deeper. This curiosity made us take up this challenge and work towards it. So we did brainstorming sessions to come up with something to tell about the mission in an interactive and easily understandable way to the kids. Finally, we decided to make a game. One of the biggest challenges was to decide what type of game. Since two members of our team are high school students, they had a chance to interact with their juniors about what games they prefer a lot. Since it was only a 2-day hackathon, we rushed to come up with the prototype, as it progressed we understood that enthusiasm to learn and share knowledge is more important. To be honest we learned more than we actually implemented. So we would like to thank NASA and all the members behind this app challenge for providing the best gateway to learn, relearn and importantly share knowledge.
Team - Mission: Sun
References
- https://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/parker-solar-probe
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parker_Solar_Probe
- http://parkersolarprobe.jhuapl.edu/Spacecraft/index.php
- https://gdevelop.io/
Tags
#Education, #NASA, #game-based-learning. #PSP