| dc.description.abstract | This thesis is a study of the American immersion pedagogy Reacting to the Past (RTTP) and how this pedagogy can be used in the Norwegian EFL classroom in lower secondary school. RTTP is a series of role playing games developed for American colleges and universities. Our thesis is split into three research questions, examining how to adapt a game for use in lower secondary school.
Together with two other MA students, we adapted the game Ending the Troubles : Religion, Nationalism, and the Search for Peace and Democracy in Northern Ireland, 1997-98, in accordance with the subject curricula, LK20. We played the game in a 10th grade class over two weeks in January 2022. In RTTP, the pupils run proceedings in the classroom and the teacher serves as the game master who oversees the process. During each session, we observed and took notes. At the end of the intervention, a survey was conducted to investigate which parts of our adaptation had succeeded or failed.
We have played RTTP at university both in Norway and the United States and have been part of a project working on developing RTTP games. The potential of the pedagogy was something we wanted to test to see if it could be used in 10th grade classes.
Our study found that it can be an effective learning tool in Norwegian 10th grade classrooms with some changes in the build-up and preparation of the game. Most of the pupils in our intervention enjoyed playing the game, saying “it was more fun than traditional teaching”. Some pupils claimed they learned more from the RTTP game than they normally would. Our study also justifies the use of RTTP as a learning tool through the competence aims in LK20. | |
