In SimSchool you are the teacher and responsible for the learning of all your students. Just like in school, you can learn about your students by reading their student profiles that include statements about their behavior and learning preferences. In the simSchool classroom, you select tasks and conversational exchanges to best fit your students’ needs. Students respond to tasks with changes in posture and statements. As you play simSchool you make decisions and experiment, and based on what happens you refine your strategies. With simSchool you play to learn to develop expertise and think like a teacher.
In simSchool, success comes through helping your simStudents improve, both in their academic performance and their behavior.
I. Getting Started
TIP: To explore
simSchool for the first time, we suggest you work with an “Individual” student
to learn the fundamentals of playing.
If
you choose the "1" student, follow the prompts to select "Fixed
Personalities" and enter a name for the
simulation. simSchool saves the final results of each simulation
you play so you can compare your results.
[Click] Create
Note: Once
you have experienced simSchool’s free version, you can purchase a
subscription that will give you access to more features, e.g.
in the one student classroom you can work with either a below,
on or above grade level student or the full 18
student classroom.
II. Preplanning
Before you play, you have the option to look at your student profiles and note your students’ learning and behavioral characteristics, in order to formulate a plan.
[Click] on the Laptop computer (1)
to
view your student profiles.
[Click] on
an individual student’s
picture to read their profile.
[Click] anywhere in the classroom outside the laptop
screen to return to
the simulation.
TIP: Each student profile includes information
on academic ability and personality characteristics.
Note: To simulate a classroom of students, simSchool assigns student profiles based on a set of randomly generated variables. Our objective is to create a student population free of any racial or gender bias. However because these students are randomly generated, there is the possibility that a set of students can be perceived as having a bias.
The free version of simSchool has a set of five student personalities in the “five student classroom.” A player or
faculty member has the option of 1) using a fixed set of students - one high performing student, three average and one low performing student. 2) Having a randomly generated set of students each time. In the future, a player or faculty member will have the option of using the same classroom of
students used in a previous session, of creating a classroom of students based on a particular set of characteristics, e.g a classroom of special needs students. We are sensitive to gender and racial issues and are aware that a perception of bias is possible in a set of simSchool students.
III. Start – Pause – Stop
simSchool
Panel [4] is where you START, PAUSE,
or STOP the
simulation
[Click] on the Triangle to start the
simulation. A message appears that
the simulation is running along with the iteration number.
[Click] at any time on the double bars in the center
to pause the
simulation and then [click] on the double bars again
to continue.
[Click] on the square to conclude your
session and go to reports.
IV. Playing the Game
Tasks
Tasks change a student’s academic performance.
Four types of tasks available
“Recall” “Skill/concept” “Strategic
thinking” and “Extended thinking”
TIP: Select the kind of task
that best fits the learning and behavioral characteristics
of your students.
Assigning Tasks
You can assign tasks to the whole class or
individual students.
TIP: A task that
is highly structured is more suited to students who are “teacher directed” while
a task that allows students to work on their own fits those
who prefer to work “independently.”
To assign a task to the whole class
Use The Bell (2) 
to work with the whole class.
[Click] on the bell to select the whole class.
Next
move your cursor to the far left
[Click] on the
Paper and Pencil symbol. [3] 
[Scroll] over
the symbols to
select the LEVEL of difficulty for
the task:
Level 1 Recall (e.g., computation)
Level 2 Skill/concept (e.g. word problem)
Level 3 Strategic thinking (e.g. problem
involves reasoning)
Level 4 Extended thinking (e.g. develop a
project plan)
Next move the cursor over the pencil
and paper symbol to view the
possible tasks and then [Click] on
the symbol to select the task.
To toggle an action off - When
working with the whole class,
[Click] on the Bell again
to return to the classroom,
To select a task for individual students
TIP: A student that
has good grades or scores in their profile needs a higher
level task such as one that requires strategic thinking
or extends his/her thinking while a student at the lower
end, might do well on a recall or a skill based task.
[Click] on an individual
student.
Then move your cursor to the far left and [click] to
select a level and then a specific task. When you select
a task, the teacher announces the task to the class.
V. Conversations
Conversations impact a student’s behavior
and academic performance.
NOTE: The conversational choices allow
the teacher to respond in a variety of ways, depending on what
the student is doing. For example if a student has continually
been disruptive, and the player has tried warm and friendly
responses with no change in behavior, the player can try a cold
or dominating statement such as “When are you going
to learn the rules!” that can result in the student
halting his/her behavior.The conversational choices comprise
two dimensions of interpersonal interactions: power and affiliation.The
power dimension ranges from taking control to giving choices
and the affiliation dimension ranges from warm and close to
distant and cool language. The simulation is not
trying to model perfect teacher behavior but is instead attempting
to give a full range of possible teacher behaviors at all times. What
is gained through playing simSchool is the understanding that
any possible combination of conversational exchanges might
be the most appropriate to bring the student back into an
effective work-producing mode. simSchool also allows the novice
player to experiment, even with statements that could be inappropriate
and learn from observing that it doesn't have the intended
result.
Making conversation
There
are three steps to making conversation.
1) Select either whether you want to converse about behavior
(B) or
academics (A).
2) Decide whether you want to make an assertion (!)
an observation (*), or a question
(?).
3) Select from 16 different statements
that exemplify 16 interpersonal positions
e.g., friendly, warm, cold, authoritative.
Tip: If your student is
introverted you might need to be warm and friendly; if unreliable,
you might want to be dominant.
To select a conversational statement
To talk to the whole class, [Click] on the bell.
To talk to an
individual student [Click] on the student.
[Click] on the conversation symbol
immediately
to the right of
the task - symbol. [3]
[Click] on one of the indicators:
Behavioral (B)
assertion (!), observation (*) or question (?)
Academic (A) assertion
(!), observation (*) or question (?)
Scroll over the conversational bubbles to see your choices
of statements.
[Click] on the bubble for the statement
you would like.
The teacher bubble appears and the student responds.
To toggle an action off while working with
an individual student,
[Click] on the individual student again.
VI. Interpreting student responses
There are several ways to interpret the impact of your choices
on your students.
Student
postures
- Your
student can be sitting in any one of 4 positions, from looking
attentively toward the front, to head down on the desk.
Additionally, if your student’s hand is up it could
mean one of two things – either the task is too difficult
and they need assistance or they have finished the task.
If
you click on a student, a summary of your student’s
state appears in the center panel, e.g., “Ali is currently
disruptive.” There are three boxes labeled P (Power)
H (Happy/affiliation) and A (Academic). These boxes
are visual reports of how your student is doing.
VII. Save and view reports
[Click] on the square in the lower right panel
to stop the simulation which
will take you to view reports.
Interpreting Reports
The six settings on the report indicate the student’s:
Academic ability (blue)
Intellectual openness (red)
Extroversion (lilac)
Agreeableness (yellow )
Persistence ( turquoise)
Emotional stability (purple)
NOTE: The interval between dots represents the passage
of 30 seconds of class time so 90 dots are equivalent to a 45 minute
class.
Tip: If your student is improving
the dotted line slopes up; if your student is declining the
dotted line slopes down.
A vertical bar indicates a conversational exchange while a
change in task is indicated by a change in color.
To start another simulation,
Go to the bottom of the report screen and [click] on [Home].
Selecting
your browser: simSchool works with Firefox, Netscape and Safari.
We recommend using Firefox. 