One of my favorite things I have created is a level-up choice board. Over the years I have added more and more features. This is a Google Sheets template that allows you to create “quests” (choices). Indicate how difficult it is and how much XP it is worth so the student can level up. Create a fun quest title and then assign it a badge. Students check off the tasks they chose and they level up! One of the features of the Badge Game is to create a Google Slides for the tutorials for each quest.
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Creating a Badge Game
You will need a copy of my template. Going to alicekeeler.com/badgegame will copy a Google Sheets spreadsheet.
Badge Game Steps
- Copy the template
- Rename the spreadsheet to reflect your game
- Use the Game Designer menu (next to the help menu) to select (Color Changer). Note: You will need to do this twice since the first time you are not authorized.
- Use the Game Designer menu to “Create Slides Tutorial.”
- Start with the quest descriptions. Remember, this is a game, they do not have to do ALL of the choices.
- In column B indicate the difficulty level from 1 to 5
- In column D indicate the XP (points) the quest is worth. This is NOT assignment points, but just the XP points to level up. Tip: tell students to reach a certain level rather than a certain number of quests or points.
- Go to the Badges tab to change the badges for the game.
- Create fun quest titles in column F.
- Use the Game Designer menu to “Create Student Version.”
- Distribute a copy of the student version to each student. They check off the quests they do and submit the spreadsheet for a grade.
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Slides Tutorial
This blog post is focusing on the one feature “Slides Tutorial.” You can only put about a sentence in the description in column G. This is often not enough information for the student to complete the task. Column I and J provides a space for you to link to a YouTube video, website, or tutorial to help the student.
I like to make a single Google Slides for the tutorials. Not a Google Slides per tutorial, but just one Google Slides for the entire Badge Game. The individual slides in the Google Slides contain the quest directions.
A cool thing about Google Slides is each slide has a unique URL.
If I am on slide 15 and copy the URL link at the top, that link will go directly to slide 15. I want to provide in the Badge Game spreadsheet the link to the specific slide that shows the tutorial.
Google Slides Tutorial
To make it easier to create the Google Slides tutorial I have added this feature to the Game Designer menu. Select “Create Slides Tutorials.” This will automatically create a fresh Google Slides. The Slides permissions will be changed to “Anyone with the link can view.” Then for each row on the spreadsheet a “Click Here” will be added and hyperlinked to a specific slide in the Google Slides.
Click Here
The link to the individual slide in the slides tutorial will be placed in the spreadsheet. Click on this to open the specific slide for that quest. Notice that the slide is blank. This allows you to add screenshots, text boxes, embed videos, or other elements to provide directions to the student.
Delete Click Here
If you use the Google Slides tutorial option, a slide is assigned to ALL the rows (quests). It is super handy, for me, to have the tutorial link pre made. However, I do not always use the Slides tutorial option. Simply single click on the cell with the “Click Here” and delete the text. The slide will still exist. It does not bother me to have blank slides in my tutorial slides. You could choose to delete the slides manually if you wish.
