"Letting the Game Club be the hosts for events including planning, advertising, budgeting, setting up and taking down was critical.."

~Terri Kirk
Reidland High School
Paducah, KY

Game Club

Reidland High School, Paducah, KY

Reidland High School serves 560 students in rural McCracken County, Kentucky.

The Game Club is an extension of the chess club expanded encompass board games and role-playing games.

Running the Program

The Game Club meets once a month during the school day when other, more typical school clubs meet such as Future Farmers of America, Future Business Leaders of America, DECA, etc. Students may sign up for up to four clubs since there are "Club Days" once per week.

The students in Game Club at Reidland High School are not typical joiners and most of them do not belong to any other club. The current group is about 40 boys and 15 girls ranging from 9-12 grades. The only requirement to be in Game Club is that each member must play games during club time.

Equipment

Popular games include Battleship, Yahtzee, Clue, Monopoly, and cards. Two videogames are set up during Club Day--Guitar Hero and Wii--and names are drawn to allow students to play these games as well.

Literacy Connections

The Game Club brings together a diverse group that formed a community through collaboration and reflection in their gaming experiences. The members of the Club use their preexisting knowledge to play, but through play they develope and refine new questions based on each individual game. They apply their existing understanding with each new gameplay experience to evaluate and draw conclusions and plan strategies. The students havethe ability to adjust and refine these conclusions as the games continue, and as the Club continues to meet.

Impact

The Game Club hosted the first Cyber Night (videogame free play event) for Teen Tech Week in March 2007 and another event in November of 2007. Since then, the club has expanded to 150 members, but limited space means 40-50 students can attend each meeting to play games together.

The Game Club was responsible for a week-long gaming event prior to the state testing window. Members of the club provide the videogaming equipment and the school provided whiteboards, projectors, and TVs that were set up in the gymnasium. Each day, one grade level was allowed to have a celebration day that included a cookout and time to play videogames in the gym. The Game Club members were responsible for each station and helped by assuring that turns were taken properly and the equipment was treated respectfully. Games played included Rock Band, Guitar Hero, WII Sports, Super Mario Smash Brothers and DDR.

Resources

For more information, please contact Terri Kirk at terri.kirk@mccracken.kyschools.us.

Chess Club Webpage