Plus One Me
If you play video games, know someone who plays video games or have students who play video games… (wait a second, isn’t that pretty well everybody?) then this is a fun and very simple way to acknowledge their strengths. Wildly popular video games like World of Warcraft or Runescape or even classics like Dungeons and Dragons include a system of ongoing improvement.
For example in World of Warcraft, if you gather the necessary materials to sew together a nice Spellweave Robe, you’ll probably gain +1 onto your tailoring profession and then +96 Stamina, +89 Intellect and +52 Spirit if you decide to wear your new fancy robe. This is a system and vocabulary that is common to anyone who has ever played a role playing game.
Of course, I would love to give +10 motivation to my teenaged kids every once in awhile or could use +50 patience in my classroom at times. Somehow, even though gamers know + 1′s are virtual, the feeling of accomplishment and motivation to gain more +1′s is real. I wonder how +1′s could be used in a classroom environment to stimulate the same type of motivation and sense of accomplishment and confidence students gain while gaming. How about +1 Problem Solving or +1 Including New Friends or +1 Laughing?
Plus One Me lets you send a +1 along with an explanation with a simple email to a deserving friend or student. So far, Plus One attributes fall into three general categories, mental, social and physical and include +1 humor, +1 backbone and +1 inspiring among many others.
By the way, I learned about this great site from Jane McGonigal’s new book “Reality is Broken.”
