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The Busy Board® both sides of the story.

The busy board is not a game and I am not a game designer. I post this very long story about the development of a visual educational tool for those who may be interested.

The busy board is best described as a “hands on” storyboard used by parents or siblings to familiarise younger child with basic educational topics. It is a quad fold board with no centre. Four double-sided inserts correspond to images on the board or cards. An insert and component are selected for use, the rest stay in the box until needed. The board was named by the professional educators who worked with me over a two year period to get it simplified.

Other names suggested for the board were Morph (changing appearance), Bagel (hole in the middle), Grow (increased levels of difficulty), Brag (look mum!) and PNSP (point, name, say and play). PNSP was chosen, and then dropped when I came across the PSP during a search.

The first busy board was made in response to a mother’s complaint that her family confused the 3 year old with too much educational information. The mother wished for a product that she could keep on display for family members to see what her son was up to. This interested me and we talked about what type of features we would look for in a child’s educational tool.

• Something for the whole family – no rehashing of topics for older children.
• Simple in function - older children can participate in showing younger siblings
• Short sessions
• Require no additional purchases
• Be “stepped” in topic
• Be visual when on display
• Involve human interaction – computers can’t give cuddly rewards.

The idea had many facelifts before it actually became a board and I removed the centre; this idea was given to me by a parent who had enrolled in adult literacy classes to keep up with her children.

"…I couldn’t read. It was easier to cut the words out and make up my own stories for them… "

Years later I met with a retired school principal who gave me some advice, then referred me on to an early childhood teacher. During this second meeting it was suggested I find a patent attorney. Some members on BGDF yelled PARANOID. I decided to ignore the suggestion of paranoia and listen to the teacher for the following reasons:

1. The provisional allowed me to “consult” with a large number of people (outside of the gaming industry) on several subjects I knew nothing about.
2. IP search – personal searches had been restricted to “the game board”, or hampered by search engine omissions.

The three patent websites required interesting search terms to be effective. I had not found a busy board of this type, but wanted to make sure it was not common before committing to it.

Only a patent attorney was able to give me the guidance needed to establish novelty.

The busy board is dual purpose; it has two modes of use, educational discussion or game play. The educational images are part of the overall scene and are not immediately identified as “bands” by many who have viewed the board.

Mode 1 – educational discussion
• There is no game play. Children as young as three can be shown the first level.
• The appearance of the board changes with topic.
• Components include a choice of inserts, cards and counters.

Mode 2 – game board
• The end game suits an older age group (8+) and involves none of the edcational topics displayed on the inserts.
• The appearance of the board does not change during game play.
• Components include the first insert, cards, currency and dice.

Internal testing of the busy board was no problem. One of many children in my life is in preschool. We have been using the board intermittently with him for eighteen months now and are up to the numerals insert. Our neighbor borrowed the board for a while to help her 9 yo understand direction and time. Initially these two concepts were dropped as a cost cutting exercise, the testers argued for them to be left in. I am glad that I took this advice as it has been great to see the board used by different age groups.

External testing was solved when a special ed teacher agreed to trial the board during six weeks of his after school program. Following this, a number of his colleagues offered their help on everything from proof reading to referencing and feedback. I am truly grateful to these professionals for their assistance. Not one of them requested, or accepted, any form of compensation for their time.

The backbone of testers was a small group of dedicated teachers and parents, who have dropped in and out of my home regularly over the last few years.

I stayed open to suggestion, supplied lots of coffee and cake, and never argued with them – they were always right.

Parental volunteers were friends of friends; far enough from my social circle to be honest. Parents were no different to the teachers in their opinion of the busy board itself. There were big differences in how they felt it should be used. This was an interesting time, with a teacher using the board in a class type setting, and parents using it at home.
Continued heated debates were inevitable, but short lived. I went with the majority, unless documented evidence swayed the team. The top ten debates are listed to give you an idea.

1. The booklet was too wordy (the final draft has lost all teacher suggested plans).
2. Direction should be restricted to “the board”.
3. Measurement should be displayed on an insert.
4. Counting objects should not continue to 26.
5. The word numeral should be used (this one fascinated me - it was between teachers!).
6. The learning out comes should not be listed (again between teachers).
7. 125 counters should be made available.
8. References should be on the cards.
9. Colours and shapes should be on their own insert.
10. The animals should be changed to easily recognised ones.

There were many more debates; every one required additional research, or a redo of the booklet / board. For version one I was determined to keep the unusual animals. I did not want to display domestic animals or just those that were commonly known. Besides, the youngest child using the board could say “Optimus Prime” by the age of three. “Vulture” was no problem for him as a four year old.

Changes and more changes, I thought they would never end! Eventually we could not simplify the idea, or make any changes that would improve on what we already had. Except one…How could I have a board with no game?

I felt it was time to say “enough is enough”.

If you find testing a single idea difficult, I recommend you avoid the double act. It had taken many months of tests for the busy board to meet the satisfaction of participating parents, teachers and children. By this stage I was deplete of ideas, wanted to cancel patent and drop the game.

The first busy board’s title would not be Arajii, had a tester not demanded I include the game. This parent argued “potential” and felt the game could support the cards that had been scrapped. I had no idea on game design yet all were willing to carry on, and help came from a newly discovered source …

I found the orange BGDF during a web search; contacting one of the members led to the GDS. Reading the entire history of this challenge is a good place to start when trying to make a game from predetermined components.

The GDS did not give me any ideas for Arajii, just a lot of things to avoid such as the linear track, “roll and move”, runaway leaders, monopoly clones, patents and unnecessary rules.

All of the above are big mistakes to most that frequent BGDF. I had every single one! I found this amusing, but it made me very leery of publicly posting to the forum. I did not have time to read long winded scathing posts, which would have sapped “creative thinking”, through my equally long winded scathing responses. I pm’d BGDF members who came across as non biased and hovered over chat until a friendly name appeared. It has been a great learning curve for me; on the whole BGDF members are helpful and most responded to my incessant questions.

Art was a huge problem; high fees, return of ownership, being an unknown and requiring a non game like appearance. All of these issues were solved by two BGDF members. One advised me to look outside the industry; the other gave me the name of a graphic design studio. Initially I was a bit sad about not using a game design artist, but I could not say that the “game” would be published. If it proved too expensive, we intended to release the art through picture books, educational cards and jigsaw puzzles. I could not commit to returning ownership and was very grateful when given Marianne Lins contact details. Marianne deserves all the kudos she gets, a very accommodating lady who views customer service as paramount.

I allowed the alphabet band to define a linear track. I could not think of a better mechanic for this so used “roll and move” with a modifying choice. The rule that helped the run away leader was deliberately left in – it was good fun watching the antics of those who really wanted the dice to land in their favor, which did not happen often.

To counter the run away leader I used a tester’s suggestion of disaster cards which made all players relocate to one area. It is interesting to watch the changes in player emotions as they get closer to winning, or hear the comments when these cards come out early.

I could not get currency into the busy board or game; it did not have a reason to be there. A BGDF member gave me encouragement to go back over the existing components and identify a potential resource from these. The counters were then given images and became equipment tokens.

The monopoly clone was inevitable when a play tester demanded retribution for some one landing on his animal. In defense I can say the board has no “go to jail”. In fact the board has no words at all; therefore no start or finish, and no specified areas. These issues were solved by a visit to a national park. There is now a scale in the rule book to define movement and visitor passes to start the game. There is one exception to the decision for all wording to be card based; the first insert will always display the board’s title / name of game.

There is an unnecessary rule in the game; it involves giving players the choice not to read. As explained to me

…giving children the choice may identify those who cannot read. The parent can help…

On a personal note: the deliberate inclusion of an unnecessary rule and other subtle “errors” prevents me from claiming the title “game designer”. Designers do everything they can to perfect the game, I have chosen not to.

Game type, referencing, prototyping, publishing, comments and criticisms were also difficult but I won’t go there.

I surrounded myself with committed experts when I did not have an answer.

The busy board does what it was designed to do. I can use the board to help young children in my life learn about basic educational concepts, or I can play Arajii with older family members.

There will not be so many peskity questions, I now have a little understanding of the game industry (having annoyed the heck out of every publisher and designer I found). Single requests are coming in for different themes so professional educators may still get badgered.

To date we have had requests for educational boards such as ocean life, bush tucker and mythology. One of the tester’s is trying to factor in historical events by using each band as a time line. Some friends see potential with the insert concept as an “abstract tournament”, larger inserts and varying difficulty. A judo game was another suggestion. Each insert being colour coded to junior belts, each level ending on a different skill set.

The busy board may become a commonly used base for more themes and games, it may not. As one of the tester’s noted in his summing up

…with a busy board many things can be taught; it is only limited by our imagination…

This type of feedback gives me hope for the busy board’s future. The current game is a different matter.

I did not set out to design a game; Arajii is the current busy board’s end game, evolving through a predetermined layout and theme intended to maximize educational content. The game is non-designer; and future busy board games are at risk of becoming theme changes, or board expansion sets, limited by my imagination.

Thing is …. I do not want to just change the theme; I would really like to see the game and title change with each version. I have caught the bug, and am already trying to develop a second busy board with a different theme, game and title … before the first is even published.

Comments

Wow

This was a very ambitious project. Good luck moving forward with it. Do you have pictures any where that I can see the finished product? I'm having a hard time visualizing what it actually looks like (specifically the hole in the middle).

Thanks!
-Darke

I will have some pictures ...

I will have some pictures ... when it is finished.

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blog | by Dr. Radut