Below is an excerpt from the original article posted by the Wisconsin Center for Education Research.

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‘Field Day’ Blends Art and Science for Video Games That Teach, Engage

UW–Madison Research Lab and Game Studio Launches Game, Selects Concept for Another

Ann Marsh has heard the question before.

The UW–Madison teaching assistant and PhD candidate in entomology said people ask her “all the time” why, out of all the living things on Earth, she chose to study insects.

“And I always tell everybody, ‘If you could see what I see through the microscope, you would know why,’” she said. “This whole world of small insects that are out there, small organisms that are so beautiful and complex and specialized—they’re just so wonderful.”

This blend of beauty and utility also drives UW–Madison’s Field Day, a research lab and game design studio based in the School of Education’s Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER), where Marsh recently helped develop the concept for Field Day’s next planned game: an exercise in agricultural entomology in which players will help farmers protect their crops by managing a lively cast of “good bugs” and “bad bugs.”

“There is this unique interrelationship between art and science that we see in so many ways, and I’m so grateful for it,” said Sarah Gagnon, an artist and director of Field Day’s game studio. “It’s like a dream that we get to work on this together.”

Read more at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research

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