Sixteen pupils at Ekuthuleni Primary School, in Phoenix north of Durban, are among 5 000 pupils at 100 eThekwini schools who have taken enthusiastically to MindBlown, a play-based learning game.
Thobile Msani, who leads the Domino Foundation’s Life Skills programme, said her youth worker team has added the card game to the extra-mural activities.
She said the game stimulates reading, learning science and technology facts and encourages teamwork, which is an important component of the game. There is a downloadable mobile version as well but most of the pupils at the two schools do not have access to cellphones.
“The card version is a real hit with the learners. It generates a lot of interest in discovering more about the very real environmental issues their generation is inheriting and will have to deal with. They learn and have fun playing this game,” said Ms Msani.
“Each learner chooses a card (called collectibles) from a different category and then reads the self-answering questions to which the answer is either ‘Myth’ or ‘Fact’. The correct response earns a point and the players have learned new facts.”
She said the Domino Youth Workers keep a record of the scores through the term. The enthusiastic participants at the school not only vie with each other in the after-class sessions, but also have joined the Mind Blown League. At the end of each term, the four pupils with the highest scores attend the League’s inter-schools tournaments,” said Ms Msani.
“There’s no denying that the game, which was developed in Durban eight years ago, is showing results and getting the children to learn in a fun way.”
Youth Worker, Nomthandazo Khosa, said she loves seeing the pupils discovering new information every time they play MindBlown.
“It really does blow their minds and they never get bored with the questions. It sharpens their minds and reasoning skills. It is fun and educational at the same time. We enjoy playing it with them ourselves,” said Ms Khosa.
“We have so many keen players each week. We need to be able to develop the game’s effectiveness even further by buying more sets of cards so that our class-size can increase. It will also enable us to transport our winning team to the tournaments.”
