1997
digital game
tiltfactor.org
The Story | Game Play | Research
The Story
The Adventures of Josie True is a web-based historical adventure game for girls. The hero of the game is Chinese-American Josie True, a regular girl who becomes involved in intrigue across time and space as she tries to find her inventor-turned-teacher Ms. Trombone. She time travels with one of Ms. Trombone’s inventions, the Intellicat.
During their travels, they meet a host of historical figures including women from history such as Bessie Coleman, the first African American woman pilot.
At each stop in the journey, there are fun, rewarding activities to play in order to find Ms. Trombone, stop the artifact thieves, help
Bessie Coleman at her airshow, and much more!
Research
The game was designed with four goals in mind: to increase the use of technology by girls between the ages of 9 -11, to promote heroes from under-represented groups, to increase math and science skills, and to change misconceptions about math, science, and technology in order to encourage girls to pursue those fields. Evaluation indicated that it accomplished its goals, effectively changing players’ attitudes and increasing their interest in math, science and technology.
Awards
- 2002 Awarded the Education Planet “Online Project Top Site Award” by for quality content & utility http://www.educationplanet.com/topsites/onlineproject.html
- 2001 Riding the Meridian “Recommended Site” http://www.heelstone.com/meridian/links4.html
- “Site of the Month,” December WIEO.org, The Women in Engineering Organization
- 2000 “Website to Watch” 2000 Girlstart, formerly SmartGrrls (http://www.girlstart.org)
- -Featured in Print: The NY Times (4/29/00), The Chronicle of Higher Education (2/18/00) (http://chronicle.com/free/2000/02/2000021801t.htm)
- -Internet-only: The Benton Foundation (http://www.benton.org/News/032900.html), Officedotcom (http://www.herinteractive.com/buzz/officecom/article.htm), Featured on WBFO / NPR including “The Best of our Knowledge.”
