Abstract
This chapter presents a new platform for technology-mediated learning that holds the promise of helping to teach students to both think and act like professionals in a particular discipline. It provides an educational experience that goes beyond presenting information- and skill-based content knowledge and leading students to develop greater interest and more mature perspectives of the field. We have called this new educational platform a Playable Case Study (PCS). It is planned to be a 2-week interactive simulation that allows students to take the role of a professional and interact with fictional characters through online mediums such as emails, online chats, and videoconferencing. We present findings on research conducted with a group of college-aged students who participated in a PCS called Cybermatics, designed to introduce students to the work of a cybersecurity professional. We found that the Cybermatics PCS was successful in giving students a hands-on, interactive skill-building experience that ultimately reshaped their perceptions of cybersecurity and increased their interest in the field. We believe that the PCS has potential to be a useful learning tool to teach beyond instructional content and help students develop skills, attitudes, viewpoints, values, and interest in not only cybersecurity but other fields as well.
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Winters, D.M. et al. (2020). The Playable Case Study: An Online Simulation for Skill and Attitudinal Learning. In: Hokanson, B., Clinton, G., Tawfik, A.A., Grincewicz, A., Schmidt, M. (eds) Educational Technology Beyond Content. Educational Communications and Technology: Issues and Innovations. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37254-5_11
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