We just returned from our trip to Pennsylvania for Save Against Fear, and it has all been such a wonderful ride, meeting people and talking about the work we’re doing with therapeutic gaming.
Our video of our PAX panel should be posted soon, followed by our video from Save Against Fear, but in the meantime, here were our highlights from PAX Prime:
Gaming Professionals
PAX Prime is full of leaders in the field of both analog and digital gaming. Game designers were often standing beside their games and were eager to share about their creations. We met the founder of Gaems, John Smith, who left a stable business career to follow his dream of manufacturing portable gaming platforms. He was an inspiring entrepreneur!
We also spoke with Monte Cook and the team from Monte Cook Games about the latest games they have been developing, including No Thank You Evil!, which we are very excited to start using in our groups once it is released. We’ll have special posts about the game once the rulesets are officially released.
Anthony Maitz, the designer of Playsets was nice enough to share with us a code for their mobile app that will let us use an iPad in our tabletop gaming groups instead of using a traditional wet erase marker board. We also had some great discussions about following his passions to create his software.
Meeting these professionals was a treat, and hearing firsthand about their work was an honor, but the true treasure of our PAX Prime experience was
Professionals Who Game
The other fantastic takeaway from PAX Prime this year was the large number of people we met who were professionals—therapists, teachers, etc.—who use gaming in their professional work. After our panel presentation, many people came up afterwards to speak with us about how they were also looking to use gaming therapeutically. We were not the only panel to discuss the therapeutic effect of gaming, either.
Anna Vagin, a therapist from the bay area in California, presented about her use of video games and online videos to help adolescents develop social skills. She was so generous to give us a copy of her book,
YouCue Feelings: Using Online Videos for Social Learning, which explains how she uses online videos to help her clients. We’re looking forward to reading it!
YouCue Feelings: Using Online Videos for Social Learning, which explains how she uses online videos to help her clients. We’re looking forward to reading it!
Tyler Black, a psychiatrist from B.C., presented for the fifth year in a row about the latest research information on video games, addiction, and mental health. His presentation, the slides of which will be on his website soon, pointed to the fact that the majority of research that problematizes gaming is based on flawed research methods and very small sample sizes.
The final day of PAX was a panel featuring #teacherswhogame, a group of educators and education specialists who directly use or support the use of gaming in their professional lives. The world of education and therapy have a distinct overlap, and sharing ideas with the teachers and professionals afterwards was truly inspiring. We’re looking forward to collaborating with them!
Stay tuned for the video of our panel! It should be up soon!
Know someone who would benefit from Wheelhouse Workshop’s social skills groups?
Call or email us to learn about how we can support your child’s social development with a fun, socially rewarding experience. Spots for our Fall groups are still available. Reserve now!
Phone: 206 – 588 – 5523
Email: contact@wheelhouse-workshop.com
Wheelhouse Workshop was founded in 2013 by Adam Davis and Adam Johns with the mission to provide enriching and socially rewarding experiences to neurodiverse youths using tabletop role playing games with in-game scenarios intentionally designed to target real-world areas of social growth.