Passover is a challenging holiday for most families I know, including mine. Let’s use the “Dayenu” song (It would have been enough!) to list some of the obvious triggers:

• Remove all food from the house. Dayeinu!
• Clean the kitchen perfectly and re-kosher the counters, sink, stove, and ovens. Dayeinu!
• Lock up the year-round dishes and utensils and take out the Passover utensils. Dayeinu!
• Buy all fresh food and additional supplies to last a week or maybe several months. Dayeinu!
• Run up the credit card to thousands of extra dollars. Dayeinu!
• Cook and prepare everything from scratch. Dayeinu!

By the time the first night’s seder starts, the adults are usually ready to go to sleep, but we have this extensive educational program handed down by tradition that is supposed to be stimulating for all ages and children in particular.

Last year, I decided I would be proactive. I would gamify the seder. I invited two of my bright and enthusiastic grandchildren to come over and help me plan. Being a beginner at gamification design, I hoped their creativity would fill in some of my limitations. We created several Powerpoints which we planned to print and use as game cards. One of the kids created a game board. I wasn’t sure how we would play this, but my main goals were simple:

• Share the responsibility for running the seder among the participants.
• Avoid our humdrum “go around the table and read the story” mode.
• Prevent any serious meltdowns.
• Involve the kids at least for the first 20 minutes.

We succeeded on all counts for both seders, but not because of any carefully designed game design.

Here’s what worked:

• Divide the attendees into teams. Young kids under 10 would be teamed with adults.
• Take the game cards that represent each part of the seder and have the youngest kids use a spinner to choose which parts of the seder their team will lead.
• Give the kids Lego to keep them occupied on the side.
• When we get to the story part of the seder, have the teams read among themselves rather than doing it in whole group mode.
• Provide choices that include not participating in the seder as long as those in the room don’t disrupt those who want to participate.

Reflection: The spinner was very tactile and the kids liked it. Random assignments for teams to lead parts of the seder was brilliant! Clear expectations for cooperation with flexibility and choices were key. While I needed a lot more experience in game design before I was ready to level up, this was a good start. My family really enjoyed the seders.

What are my next steps?

• Recruit colleagues and play some games.
• Consult with colleagues for advice.
• See what kind of suggestions I can glean from the upcoming gamification webinars I’m producing and moderating for the Association of Educational Therapists.

I’m produced and moderated two Association of Educational Therapists webinars on gamification. The first was on May 17th, called “For the Win!”. Our presenter was Kevin Werbach, a professor from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business. The second webinar, on June 27, was called “Gamifying the Writing Process”. Our presenter was Jonathan Cassie, an educator, gamer, and game designer who provides extensive training to educators.

Here’s a link to the AET webinar page where you can view the gamification webinars: https://aetonline.org/webinar-archives