Celebrate Nonfiction

Exploring the Joy of Nonfiction Reading and Writing

Behind the Books: What the Heck Is Gamification?

In June, I presented
at a very special event—the first-ever conference dedicated to children’s
nonfiction. Held on the SUNY New Paltz campus, the Twenty-first Century Nonfiction
Conference offered unique opportunities for writers, artists, editors, designers,
art directors, packagers to talk shop. It was truly inspiring.

In a great workshop,
author and app creator Roxie Munro
introduced me to a new term—gamification. It’s content delivered (via a book or
other media) in a game-like format. In the case of books, it’s basically a way
of structuring the text. And this kind of structure is both fun and
interactive.

Roxie’s very popular
picture book Hatch!
is a great example, but the more I thought about it, the
easier it became to name other books that are also structured as games. Here
are some examples:

Butterfly Eyes and Other Secrets of the Meadow by
Joyce Sidman

What Do You Do with a Tail Like This? by
Steve Jenkins & Robin Page

How Many Ways Can You Catch a Fly? by
Steve Jenkins & Robin Page

Where in the Wild? by David M. Schwartz, Yael Schy, and Dwight Kuhn

Where Else in the Wild? by David M. Schwartz, Yael Schy, and Dwight Kuhn

What in the Wild? by David M. Schwartz, Yael Schy, and Dwight Kuhn

While gamification
isn’t one of the nonfiction text structures specified in Common Core ELA RI
standard #5, it’s certainly an approach that I’m going to try with at least one
of my works in progress.

CCCCSS
ELA RI #5

Grade 4
Grade 5

Describe
the overall structure (chronology, comparison, cause/effect,
problem/solution) of events, ideas, concepts, or info in a text or part of a
text

Compare
and contrast the overall structure (e.g., chronology, comparison,
cause/effect, problem/ solution) of events, ideas, concepts, or info in two
or more texts
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