Increasing children's social competence through games, an exploratory study

We describe the design and evaluation of Playground Architect, a multi-player game designed to help shy children gain social confidence. The game is played by a small group of children around an interactive tabletop surface using a tangible user interface. The game was evaluated with 32 children (mean age 9.5). All players enjoyed the game. Shy children enjoyed being in charge and were quite talkative during play. Interviews with teachers show that some shy children behaved notably more outgoing. These results illustrate the potential of socially educational games