2 Exploring Spore
The objective of this resource is to become more familiar with Spore so that you can be confident in thinking about its educational use.
Spore is a commercially available computer game created by Will Wright, the creator of Sim City and the Sims. The overall aim of the game is to take a species though five different stages of evolution: cell stage, creature stage, tribal stage, civilisation stage and the space stage.
Why use it in education?
While Spore was designed as a commercial game, its creator has frequently talked about the educational inspiration behind the game. In particular he has referenced Montessori education principles like free autonomous exploration, emphasising imagination and minimising the role of failure.
Several commentators have suggested that, because of the science related subject matter, and the educational influence on the game’s design, it could be used in schools .
While the level of the detail in the game is unlikely to teach children about any core scientific concepts in itself, it has been used to stimulate learning in the classroom across a number of different curriculum areas.
Where to start?
In looking to use Spore in the classroom, the educator has two options. They can use the commercially available game Spore itself, either in its entirety or individual levels. Alternatively, they could use Spore Creature Creator. This a small section of the game which allows you to freely create your own creatures, animate them in a small testing arena, take pictures and make YouTube videos of their actions. You can download [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] a free reduced version of Spore Creature Creator for trial to see if it is something you might like to experiment with in the classroom.
All the exercises below can be attempted with the free trial of Spore Creature Creator but please note that the terms and conditions specify this trial version can be downloaded to a single computer for personal, non-commercial, home use only.
Here’s a breakdown of possible pluses and minus for the full Spore game and Spore Creature Creator:
| Pluses | Minuses |
| Cheap – a single copy is available for under £10 at Amazon | A bought copy can only be installed on 1 machine, meaning if you want to run it on several computers you will need several copies |
| Allows students many opportunities to autonomously explore an environment | Will take time to complete and students could spend more time interested in the game then the actual learning |
| Student could play through different levels | Requires you or your students to know how to use it |
| Features different stages of the evolutionary process so there are a variety of opportunities to use it as a stimulus for learning | The science underpinning the game is not very accurate, so it will require significant planning and teacher reinforcement to map student’s in-game experiences and understanding onto curriculum requirements and real world concepts and information |
| Pluses | Minuses |
| Free to download | A version has to be downloaded onto each computer you want to use it on, so installing it on a suite of PCs will take time and cooperation from IT staff |
| Could be used in class or as homework | The game still needs a reasonably up to date computer to run it |
| Can be used as a stimulus for a variety of curriculum areas | Limited to creating a creature, and no opportunities to participate in the rest of the game |
| Is time limited, which makes it easier to fit into a lesson | Still requires students to get used to the controls |
| More easy to use than the whole game | Needs a Spore account to create a YouTube video (though other screen capture tools could easily be used) |
Reflection
Spend an hour playing with Spore or building a creature. Although the main focus is to become more familiar with the game, it is useful to think also about how your learners may be able to use this for their learning.
1 Games for learning