Warri board gameplay Warri and learning

• In Event: Language and Representation

Proposal

Introduction
Game researchers argue that games are learning spaces that enable the acquisition of skills relevant in the current century (Gee, 2013; Steinkuehler & Duncan, 2008; 2011). Exposure to games and game play has been found to encourage prosocial behaviors and participation in the real world (Ferguson & Garza, 2011).
Warri, one of the oldest board games played around the world, sometimes identified with the generic name of Mancala, is a strategic game played with pebbles on a board with 12 holes (de Voogt, 2010). Warri is played by two individuals, on a board with 12 playing holes, and 48 pebbles which are distributed equally among players (de Voogt, 2001). The aim of the gameplay is to capture as many seeds as possible using complex strategies to prevent the opponent from making moves. Anthropologists and archeologists trace its origin to Africa, and explain the wide distribution of the game to migrations (de Voogt, 2010; Bikić & Vuković, 2016). While Warri has been discussed and studied by anthropologists and archeologists since the 19th century (Bikić & Vuković, 2016), and has drawn interest among researchers, particularly mathematicians, for its potential for teaching mathematics to children (Powell & Temple, 2001), empirical studies of its gameplay are still limited (Bikić & Vuković, 2016). Little is still known about Warri play, yet, an examination of players' interaction during the gameplay can lead to an understanding of the learning that occurs.
This study purposes to look at players’ interactions with each other during Warri gameplay in order to understand the type of learning that occurs during the gameplay.
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Perspective(s) or theoretical framework
To identify the learning that occurs during Warri gameplay, this paper draws on situated learning theory. This theory posits that learning is specific to the situation in which is occurring (Anderson, Reder, & Simon, 1996; Lave & Wenger, 1991). Much of what is learned is shaped by the context in which it is learned (Anderson, Reder, & Simon, 1996). From a situated learning perspective, learning emerges from actions and interactions engage in individuals (Korthagen, 2010). Learning is therefore a process in which "we interact with each other and with the world and we tune our relations with each other and with the world accordingly" (Wenger, 1998, p. 45). Consequently, "the learning outcomes are socially constructed" (Lave & Wenger, 1991, p. 95).
Methods, techniques, or modes of inquiry
Intellectually, microethnography draws from different traditions of research ranging from context analysis to the ethnography of communication (Garcez, 2008).

Preliminary findings
An analysis of the interviews yields three themes identified as skills learned during Warri gameplay.
Warri a means for social interaction
To highlight the social aspect of the game, participants in this study distinguish Warri from video games which "are the opposite of like socializing with people that you're with" (John). During video gameplay, players "... are not like talking. They are not like looking at one another. They are not like, right. Everything is focused on the screen and the game" (John). Yet, Warri allows players to talk to each other, to look at each other, as John points out:
"just the positioning of people in Warri or other board games sort of like challenges that video game notion, right. Instead of like both of us being like facing [the screen], we're like facing one another. Um, and I, you know, I don’t play solitaire. So, playing [Warri] for me is always about the social interaction. It is about doing something with someone".
Thus, during the gameplay, participants develop social interaction skills. Because of its simple rules, Warri by design encourages and facilitates social interactions. Games with multiple rules according to John, prevent players from engaging in discussions. With Warri, “I can understand the rules quickly. Like it was just Gabriel and I playing, like you're not so involved in the game that you can’t talk. Like you could be sitting around having some drinks and playing Warri” (John).
Playing is practicing mathematics
Playing Warri board game provided an opportunity for participants to also practice mathematics. When explaining his experience with the game, Gabe states: “it makes me think, I like thinking. It pushes me to think and I think it’s, it’s…that game pushes me on something that I am not good, very good at and it is Math”. Hence, Mancala helps players to develop their mathematical skills and “it pushes [players] to keep count and…I am not a good friend with Math, numbers, so it is a fun way for me to do Math without killing myself” (Gabe).
Warri a space for strategic thinking
During gameplay, participants also engage in strategic thinking as they use different tactics to win the game, and anticipate the moves of their opponent. John, describing the pace of his moves during the game states that: "The pacing was connected to the degree of strategizing that I was doing". Strategic thinking is also evidenced in players’ discussion of the anticipated consequences of their moves:
Choosing which bucket on my side is empty can work...could possibly - not force but it could be sort of like be used as a psychological tool to direct the other person to then make a move that you are hoping that they will make. And in making that move, they’re not anticipating your next move. You might be able to get them to make a move that would then yield you a big pile of stones.

References
Anderson, J. R., Reder, L. M., & Simon, H. A. (1996). Situated learning and education. Educational researcher, 25(4), 5-11.
Bikić, V., & Vuković, J. (2016). Board games reconsidered: Mancala in the Balkans. Issues in Ethnology and Anthropology, 5(1), 183-209.
Bowen, W. (2004). Warri: African strategy game. Retrieved from http://www.angelfire.com/fl/
chessninja/warri.html

Dubreil, S. (2020). Using games for language learning in the age of social distancing. Foreign language annals

Author

• Rebecca Y Bayeck, Utah State University