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Wednesday, December 10, 2003 Home building educational game challenges students, teachers By Mac McKinney, President It’s not Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 or one of the other highly publicized video games, but the simulated home building game, Building Homes of Our Own, has captured the imagination—and attention—of middle and high school students across the country. The program challenges students to work within a budget and schedule to design and build a home, starting with the selection of a site and ending with the sale of their home to a qualified buyer. In the process, they will rely on lessons and skills they’ve learned in school as they work in groups to solve problems and make decisions — exercising their critical thinking skills. When their home is completed, players review credit applications and sell their “virtual dream house,” hoping not to go bust. “The program has really taken off,” said C. Kent Conine a builder/developer from Dallas and president of the National Association of Home Builders, the Washington, D.C.-based organization that created the game. “Building Homes of Our Own is the most successful education program we’ve embarked on, and the proof is in the extraordinary demand from teachers and the enthusiasm of students.” Teachers use Building Homes of Our Own to bring context to lessons taught in math, science, social studies, English, consumer economics and technology classes, using the comprehensive Teacher’s Guide that comes with the program to supplement classroom teaching and engage their students. Building Homes of Our Own features three levels of play within each of the four building sites found in urban, suburban, rivers and lakes, and coastline settings. Throughout the game, players encounter a variety of real-life obstacles and issues that test their skill, patience and resourcefulness. Students can elect to perform lab testing, conduct research, or call upon special consultants and engineers to help them arrive at sound decisions that satisfy environmental concerns or nervous neighbors. Attending a virtual town meeting or working within community planning and zoning laws are just a few of the many challenges students encounter. Since the program hit the streets on Sept. 25, 2002, it has been delivered free and by request to 23,000 teachers, reaching an estimated audience of 805,000 students, 46,000 teachers and 966,000 parents — over 1.8 million people in just one year. “Students are learning valuable decision making skills in a real-life application that hits a variety of subjects, and think they are just playing a game,” said Katherine Lewin, Ellenville Middle School, Ellenville, N.Y. Building Homes of Our Own earned a 2002 International EMMA (Electronic Multimedia Award), which recognizes excellence in digital media content creation through the acknowledgement of best practices and ongoing educational programs. The 11-year-old European-based international awards program attracts entries from over 40 countries. Building Homes of Our Own has received partial funding from NAHB’s National Housing Endowment and Freddie Mac. The program, including the 190-page Teacher’s Guide, is available on CD-ROM and is compatible with the Microsoft Windows operating system. One copy is free to classroom educators and members of home builder associations affiliated with NAHB through www.HomesofOurOwn.org. (Mac McKinney, who is owner and president of McKinney Builders Inc., is president of the Home Builders Association of Midwest Georgia, which serves a membership of approximately 550 builders and associate members in Fayette, Coweta, Spalding, Meriwether, Heard, Pike, Upson, Lamar, Butts and Jasper counties.)
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