Video games are an oft-cited reason for young learners getting interested in programming and computer science. As such, many learning opportunities build on this interest by having kids program their own video games. This approach, while sometimes successful, has its drawbacks stemming from the fact that the challenge of programming and game…

Video games offer an exciting opportunity for learners to engage in computational thinking in informal contexts. This paper describes a genre of learning environments called constructionist video games that are especially well suited for developing learners' computational thinking skills. These games blend features of conventional video games with…

While video games have become a source of excitement for educational designers, creating informal game experiences that players can draw on when thinking and reasoning in non-game contexts has proved challenging. In this paper we present a design principle for creating educational video games that enables players to draw on knowledge resources…