Digital Card Games: A Forgotten Tool for Learning

Karl Kapp, Professor of Instructional Technology; Director of the Institute for Interactive Technologies, Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania

Introduction

In academic circles, not much time or effort is spent talking about card games or, even, games in general. Sure, the business school might have a board game that simulates running a business or even a digitized version of the MIT Beer Distribution game used to teach systems thinking but rarely is card games mentioned. This omission is unfortunate since card games can an incredibly effective tool for learning.

Card Games in the Classroom

Although often overlooked, the flexibility and versatility of cards means that they can be used as instructional aids for all types of subjects. For example, a professor in biology might use cards to help students match species of plants to the proper genus or family. In a history class, it might mean students organize cards indicting historical events into the proper chronological order. In a language class, it might mean students matching a term in a language to its appropriate image.

Cards are great tools for helping learners order information, categorize items, and match one item to another. But cards can go way beyond ordering, categorizing, and matching. Professors have used cards to help teach critical thinking and problem-solving. In these types of card games, players must employee a specific strategy to be successful. They may need to make connections with limited information and/or predict future events or moves of rival players. Card games in which players build a deck around topics such as historical figures or ancient history incorporate strategic elements and critical thinking.

Card games are also effective learning tools because they can offer a collaborative learning experience. Games can be created or played that require students to work together to achieve a common goal, learning from each other as they progress. This can be especially powerful in developing communication and teamwork skills, as players must work together to overcome challenges and achieve success.

“Cards are great tools for helping learners order information, categorize items, and match one item to another. But cards can go way beyond ordering, categorizing, and matching.”

A well-designed deck of cards can even help create role-play games where students can practice real-world roles within their future profession. For example, it’s possible to create a card-based role-play game by writing a number of scenarios, placing them on cards, and then shuffling them into a deck. During the card game, players take turns revealing a card with a scenario then role-playing a response to a scenario. In some card games, students can even play cards to challenge other players’ answers and steal cards if they can respond to the scenario more effectively.

These various uses mean that card games can be front and center in creating an engaging, interactive and fun learning environment for students of all age groups.

The added benefit of using a card game for learning rather than an elaborate simulation or complicated game is that almost everyone understands how to play card games. The majority of students will know the basic elements of card games such as dealing, shuffling, etc.

This level of familiarity and flexibility makes card games an ideal for use as instructional materials. Precious time is not wasted explaining the conventions of the card game. The students and instructor can focus on the learning aspect of the game instead of spending time explaining or figuring out the rules of the game.

Digitization of Card Games

Until recently, one potential draw back to card games is that the players need to be face-to-face to participate in the game and in the age of digital learning that is not always possible. However, just as technology in general has continued to evolve so have card games. It is now possible to play card games in a digital environment using digital cards.

There is a growing set of software tools that have digitized the concept of physical card games. You can now play games across geographies as a group or solo with tools with these various tools. One such tool is Enterprise Game Stack, which is designed to create single and multiplayer learning card games and allows the designer of the game to customize the text of the cards, the images of the cards and even add video elements to the cards.

This new crop of digital card game tools means that an instructor, with just a few minutes of training, deploy a digital card game to their students taking full advantage of the merits of card games for learning without the need to be in the same room with students. This makes digital card games ideal for distant learning experiences and for the modern learning environment that is fast approaching.

Conclusion

While the educational landscape continues to shift under the feet of faculty, administrators, and students, reaching back to an older, more versatile, and user-friendly tool like cards might make a great deal of sense. This is especially true, when the old tool is updated to the latest technology. Consider leveraging digital card games for learning within your institution.