Video Game Design/Developers

I am curious if anyone has a solid career explorations lesson plan or unit plan they would be willing to share? Specifically in the software or game design industry. I am going to be running something like this in the next few weeks, but I am going to be creating it myself. I would love to steal/borrow/copy any best ideas.

I have a local indie game dev come to my school each year to do a presentation on the different hats you can wear in the Games industry.

Normally after that, I have students look the Careers page of a big studio because there are usually so many openings and they can get a sense of what each job requires, for example Riot Games, Careers

Then they have to make an action plan, In order for me, to get this type of job, I will need to do X, Y and Z

I don't usually prescribe it too much so it lets everyone approach it differently. I have a rubric somewhere for it.

I like to use actual companies so they can see exactly what roles are available and the requirements to get those jobs. I keep meaning to have them make Linked In profiles and then do the same on Linked In, but I run out of time, energy, steam, and interest.

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Owen Peery k12teacher
SAN FRANCISCO CA
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Here's a slideshow created by one of the professors at a local community college. It's not related to game design, but focuses mostly on the college-directed Computer-Science focused options (Software Engineering, Computer Science, Computer/Electrical Engineering, IT, InfoSys, Cybersecurity). https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1_lBaBz99XLqIS8Ea66KiUAP86N2tsFUN-6vlRi6rzm4/edit?usp=sharing

When talking about careers I like to use one of the Code.org videos on "Computer Science Changes Everything" to really emphasize that computer programming is being used in every corner of the job market.

Might not be a bad idea to find some sort of career placement survey to see how many students have a predisposition to coding and end the lesson emphasizing that you don't have to have a predisposition to find out you're good at and passionate about coding. 

Studio C has a great video on Career Placement Tests if you want to give a funny intro to the lesson.

I end my lesson with a document asking students to:

• Research 3 jobs they could see themselves doing or are interesting to them (1 has to be related to the computer industry)
  • Describe the job
  • Describe the environment (office, work from home, shopping mall, etc.)
  • Describe the education needed
  • Describe the pay & benefits
• Describe the lifestyle they picture themselves having when they're 30
  • Type of career
  • Family dynamics (married, # of kids, pets, etc.)
  • House size/type + land (small property in the city, large property in the country, etc.)
• Determine if the career they want (including pay) can afford this lifestyle.

I was poking around and found out that Riot has a nice series of videos talking about different ART career paths. https://www.riotgames.com/en/artedu/the-videos

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David Malpica k12teacher
Cupertino CA
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Poking around some more I ran into this website, with other career resources. It is based out in the UK, but found it interesting..