Hey! There are a lot more things than games that are ludic!”

Sicart “I see play as a portable tool for being. It is not tied to objects but brought by people to the complex interrelations with and between things that form daily life” (2014, Ch 1, para 10).

I will expand on the idea of being playful, to show that ludic exists both within things, and in us, humans. Thus we have these two concepts to play with:

Playful beings or ”There is more to ludic than just games!″

“Being playful” denotes an object that is playful just by existing. It invites us to play.

Ludic = being playful

Compare this Rubic’s cube to the hammer. The Rubic’s cube is designed to be played with. We shall consider things that exist playfully as

Being playful or ”There is ludic in you, too!″

“Hey! Even if the things you have at hand are not ludic, there is ludic in YOU!”

The point about the hammer is that it is NOT specificially designed for play. If we want to be playful with the hammer, the onus is on us to instigate the play. We have to be playful.

Being playful is to pursue an additional, aesthetic purpose of a given activity.

Role-playing and identity work

How can we be playful with it?

“When you operate a mechanism like a steering wheel, the device has some “play” built in: a space through which the steering wheel can be turned before the steering shaft couples with and turns the pinion at its end” (Bogost, 2016, Ch 4, para 13).

Balance it on your nose, make a pirate’s hook out of it, use it as an instrument, try and eat fries with it, etc.

It could be argued that the product of this example of

Why ludic matters

Realistically, this example might not seem very playful, maybe weak

Play with formats

Newspaper (journalism)

Tweets (and other SNS formats)

Montage portfolios

Play with approaches

Connected learning (with online communities of practice)

Student-led projects (research, product creation, etc.)

Constructivist teaching

Where is gamification?!

Remixing existing media

Role plays and simulations

Play with teaching

Participate in activities

Model activities (if you can’t do it, how can they?)

Give personal examples

Sit with students (rather than at the front)

Notice something new about a student

Give advice related to coursework, or not

Inspire (but HOW?!)

Be transparent about grades and grading

Try something new (and fail at it!)