Teaching Tabletop Role-playing Games as Art and Literature

There are more questions than answers in what follows, but this topic has been on the backburner for too long, and it’s time for me to take action and get this cooking. I’d love to get input, directions, comments, or advice.

The core question of today’s post: If you were teaching a set of precocious, smart high school juniors had a 3-4 week period to introduce them to “Tabletop Role-playing Games as Art and Literature,” how would you accomplish that task?

The background and context: For many years, I have taught AP English Language and Composition, which is, at its core, a class about rhetoric. I’m teaching high school juniors about various techniques, strategies, and devices which writers/speakers use to achieve their objectives. Those objectives span a wide spectrum: A writer/speaker might be trying to to persuade, to inform, to teach, to deliver an experience, or to accomplish diversity of goals. The College Board (which tries to define the parameters of the course) favors non-fiction prose for this particular course, but in my class, I use a much more diverse array of texts. We read novels, stories, poetry, essays, memoirs, speeches, interviews, and more.

At the start of the spring semester, I have a one-month unit on texts that incorporate visuals as a key element. For our reading, we start by looking at Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics, move on to John Berger’s Ways of Seeing, and then wrap things up with a graphic novel such as Art Spiegelman’s Maus. Along the way, we look at advertisements, political cartoons, and other comics.

Some still consider this type of thing radical, which is a testament to how old-fashioned and entrenched disciplinary boundaries remain at the high school level. It’s odd that we live in an age where images are so pervasive, yet we still insist on viewing rhetoric as belonging to the written world.

But if teaching comics is radical, they ain’t seen nothing yet.

The Task: It’s time for me to do something more genuinely cutting edge—namely, to incorporate a unit on tabletop role-playing games as literature in my AP curriculum. I may be wrong, but I don’t know that there are many high school classes out there that are taking a serious look at these games as serious works of art. (If you know of any high schools where ttrpgs are being taught as part of the curriculum, I’d love to hear about them).So there’s a lot of unexplored territory ahead. This is also a moment that is long overdue.

The problem I’m now facing is how exactly to venture into this wilderness Some key questions:

• Is there currently a book out there that does for tabletop role-playing games what Scott McCloud and Will Eisner have done for comics? That is, is there a cogent and clear summary of the medium of tabletop role-playing games as an art form and a mode of communication? This might involve a brief history, but more centrally, it needs to be a book that develops a clear vocabulary for discussing the elements of various games. It needs to be accessible to a general audience who might be coming to role-playing games new for the first time. And it needs to be engaging. If this type of book isn’t yet out there, what would be a workaround? Are there some key essays that could fill in the gap? Some videos? Some people who could lecture via Google Hangouts?
• If you had to introduce this group to a tabletop role-playing game which is both approachable and which can open up students to the possibilities of this medium, what would it be? Here, I need something like a Maus or Watchmen—some game which will evoke the response, “I had no idea that a game could be that meaningful and complex!” I had thought about Apocalypse World and Monsterhearts, but the sex move rules it out. But I would like a game that has a serious subject matter while also being fun and immersive.
• How would you actually teach the game text? Would you have them read the game and then train them in how to play a role-playing game and how to be a GM? Or maybe you go for some GM-less game? This is going to be sections of 20-students, and I would like to break them up into smaller groups of 4-6 students, but that presents some significant pedagogical challenges.
• What would you do for an assessment? Would you have them try their hand at writing a game or scenario? Would you devise a test? If so, what would that look like? Or maybe you would set up an “actual play” report, but if so, how would you set up those instructions?

There is plenty more to discuss and to consider, but that should be more than enough to get the snowball rolling. I’ll provide updates as I work through the difficulties. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Roleplaying Games in the Classroom Trenches, Part Three: The Club

In my previous posts, I considered how to bring roleplaying games into the classroom and the partial successes I have achieved. But roleplaying games are not an easy fit. They don’t work in a classroom environment without the teacher devoting sustained effort and design work to get results. And even then, the results are usually going to be mixed. (To get a sense of the mountains one must climb, go to part one of this series.)

Fortunately, the regular classroom is not the only avenue for roleplaying games in the hallowed halls. Most schools have club programs: These involve extracurricular groups that meet on a regular basis for various educationally enriching activities. For well over a decade now, I have been the active sponsor of a strategy and roleplaying game club at my school, and that context solves many of the problems that the classroom presents:

• Unlike the classroom, the students in a gaming club are volunteering for the activity. So you don’t encounter the difficulty of “forcing” someone to play games which is what happens when you have a class play a game as part of the curriculum.
• In the club environment, students can sit at tables within smaller groups, and there is no need to worry about everybody playing the same game. This flexible situation means that games can be played in numbers that they were originally designed for. 
• Intrinsic motivation is much stronger within the club: Students are not working for a grade, so they can deal with the games on their own terms and can explore them and have fun with them at their own pace and as their interests drive them.
• Clubs can open students up to a much greater array of games, activities and experiences. In my own situation, students are learning how to play different games, how to GM, how to write original scenarios, and how to design games.

While a gaming club is a more natural fit for rpgs in the school, this is not to say that there aren’t challenges. Some schools might not see the value of a gaming club and thus discourage teachers who are interested in sponsoring such a group. Typically, the scheduled time for a club is once a week (or even once every two weeks), and this time is 30-45 minutes at your typical school. That’s hardly the type of regular, sustained time that complex, immersive games require. The high school student is constantly juggling many balls, and the game club is likely to be low on the priority list for most students. And the students joining to the club will often have disparate interests in terms of the types of games they want to play and in their approaches to play.

Here are a few observations I would make to address some of these issues and to create a vibrant rpg club at a school.

Purpose and Role: It has been important that I am passionate about having fun at the table while also taking gaming seriously as a creative, artistic, and social activity. Games have regularly proven their worth in my school for the students who have participated in them. They have challenged students to develop their imaginations, to solve problems, and to improve their communication skills. Moreover, games allow them to explore dimensions of themselves and their world in a way that is safe, engaging, and meaningful. As a sponsor, I am regularly stepping back to reflect on why the club is playing the games it does and what I want to accomplish as the sponsor. If the administrators or parents ever ask me about the goals of the club, I’m excited to deliver a heartfelt, enthusiastic apologetic. Thus far, my explanations and persuasions have been forceful and successful.

Diversity and Safe Space: If you aren’t proactive about “recruiting” students for the club, you are likely to get a group of friends who all look the same and have the same interests. When the club at my school started, it was dominated by boys in the same grade. Through the years, this has changed drastically, and we now have a vibrant, diverse mix of students in terms of gender, social backgrounds, beliefs, and ages. But this doesn’t just happen. I encourage the students to draw others from outside the circle to attend, and I also ask students to give the club a shot. We also are active about making the room inviting and supportive  to those who show up. One last initiative has been to involve other teachers in games: Colleagues have been open to talking to me about how to incorporate strategy and roleplaying game ideas into their classes, and some have been active participants in our club games.

Open Room and Open Tables: One reason why the club has worked so well is that I keep an open room during the day. I realize this may not be an option for teachers at some schools, but when I start my day, I unlock my classroom door, and it stays unlocked until I leave at the end of the afternoon. Students know that they can come into my room during break, during lunch, and often after school when I am working there. The students know that they are welcome to join in on games, propose their own games, and to leave games freely.

Time Constraints and After-school Gaming: I also hold a regular 3-hour gaming session on a weekly basis. Currently, this group meets on Sunday afternoons, and it provides the opportunity for us to devote ourselves to the type of sustained game play sessions that is preferable for your most roleplaying games. During the week, the time constraints of the school day limit the types of games that can be played. The strategy game Diplomacy has been a regular staple of the club because its structure lends itself so well to individual players’ schedules. We’ve also had success with more rules light rpgs like Dungeon World as well as to short games like Munchkin or Cheat Your Own Adventure. We use those games to keep the interest going during the week, and then we have that Sunday session for those looking for longer gameplay experiences.

Safety Tools, Lines, and Good Practices: Students will look to the club advisor to take the lead in establishing boundaries, protocol, and limits. During the year, I will participate in some games, sit out on others, GM for some, and sit in as a player when a student is GMing. When at the table, I discuss the use of safety tools like the X-card, and I talk about lines. I will also call upon the more senior members of the club to assist in directing the neophytes in practices to keep the games fun and safe. We have ventured into serious and more mature topics, but I insist that students keep to a PG-13 standard, and that has worked well. There is a culture of respect that I have built up which is vital: I respect that students can run games maturely on their own even when I am not playing or hovering over it, and they respect the standards and limits I have set because they understand why I have established them.

No Dating within the Club: I give this advice with tongue partly in cheek, though there is a grain of truth to it as well. The gaming club is a social outlet for students, and they certainly hang out and socialize with each other outside the confines of my room. If those relationships develop into romance, they can present some awkward moments for the club . . . not so much when the relationships are blooming but when they encounter rocks and break-ups. I joke with my daughter (who has been a member of the game club) that we should establish a rule that club members cannot date. We would never actually do that, but when club members become sweethearts, I’m always fastening my seatbelt because I know that there may be some dramatic moments in store for us down the road.

Like a good dungeon crawl, sponsoring a roleplaying game club is filled with traps, wonders, and surprises. To succeed in the endeavor requires preparation, an awareness of the needs of the students, and a willingness to treat games with the combination of fun and gravitas they deserve. It is ultimately that combination of good spirit and soulful commitment to games that has won the day. It has, I believe, awakened both club members and administrators to these truths: (1) that games can open the way to new forms of creativity, thoughtfulness, presence, and engagement, and (2) that these developments are meeting educational, personal, and social needs key to the development of independent young adults.