Christiansen to present at Minnesota Writing and English Conference
Ryan C. Christiansen, MFA, an adjunct professor in the Department of English, will present at the 2014 Minnesota Writing and English Conference, which will be held April 3-4 at Century College in White Bear Lake, Minn. Christiansen’s presentation is titled “Fun and Games and Reasons to Write: Spurring technical writing literacy through role-play and game development,” and he will share how he is using board games, card games, and role-playing games, as well as a fictional game development company, as the reason for students to write technical documentation, including mission and vision statements, job advertisements, resumes, letters of application, instructions, proposals, feasibility reports, and web sites. At the beginning of the semester, students get to know the “company manager” through initial one-on-one meetings, and they help to drive textbook learning by giving informative PowerPoint presentations during “company meetings.” They accomplish brainstorming for technical documentation and game development through speed-dating activities, and they even get to play games during class. (Shh!…)