It was with a survey of students that we found the problems with our generation and play. We found that students not only saw play as something for children but they didn’t see the benefit of play in their individual fields.

PROBLEM
Students see play as something for children, and not necessary to be apart of their daily routine.

SOLUTION
Create a project that educates the student body about play and its positive effects.

It was along the path of researching play, that we learned if you aren’t enjoying the experience, it isn’t play. Emotions that accompany play include feeling refreshed, relaxed, confident, as well as an increase in endorphins. Play brings positive emotions. It vivifies the brain, pushing aside our demanding thoughts, it’s like a mental reset button. Play can also lower your stress levels, boost your optimism, increase your motivation, and improve concentration and perseverance.

We started to apply this research in the way we attacked this project, we changed how we managed our time and dealt with road blocks. We played our way through problems, if we were stuck on how to communicate the right idea we would roll out a huge role of paper and draw our problem out as an image we could defeat. It was our experiments with play that reshaped us as designers.

Every week we met as a team to review that weeks findings and update our running definition of play. Below is our final definition for the first semester. Play is defined as an evolving, essential activity for everyone, both individually and collaboratively, that results in rewarding enjoyment, brain and character development and positive emotions, especially when it is not interrupted in an adaptable environment.

At the close of the first semester we made a book of our findings and included proposals for projects to solve the problem we found in our research. 

OVERVIEW
Experience design, where individuals will go through steps to understand essential principles of play, with clues and puzzles that require the individual and group to work together. Every clue is connected to a visual and a principle of play and they learn about each principle when they finish the whole event. Most of the tasks require a change of perspective to help students see the space they are used to in a new light.

TARGET AUDIENCE
College students, and faculty of BYU-I

PSYCHOGRAPHICS
Our audience is content with how they play and it’s not play in its truest form.

EMOTIONAL TARGET
Each player will feel at the end that play is amazement, surprise, joy, ecstasy, serenity, anticipation. As well as optimism, trust, and content.

TONE
Our project will be epic, and as we help people understand the importance of play and its principles we will also help them have fun. It will be friendly, but serious as well, making them be aware of how play should be part of their everyday lives and of the environment where they are at.

SUPPORTING POINTS
The magic circle and the pervasive game circle, experience design, playful environments, deep focus, effective play and the five senses, a change of perspective.

GOALS/AMBITION
The project will bring students and faculty from a wide range of departments to our presentation. It will also be thorough, planned out and work flawlessly. We’d also like to include the five senses and really have this be an experience for people to remember forever.

The goal is to change the culture of play. We want people to have a personal aha! moment and come to understand how play is relevant to them. They’ll be able to take these principles and incorporate them into aspects of their life.

At the end of the exhibit we had a sign in book and conclusion information. The stand that they book was on had an opening on the left that could only be seen if you finished the exhibit. It was in here that you could get access to the level two information; a decoder wheel. All the banners from all the labs had hidden information that went into more depth about play.

Creating Play Labs was the ultimate experience we had at BYU-Idaho. We not only learned about play but we lived it. We solved problems with play, and we created problems that we wanted to solve. Road blocks became a break to experiment with different mediums and solutions. We were more productive than we have ever been and the time required daily was willingly given and enjoyed.