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UI FACULTY OF ENGINEERING ACADEMICS CREATE ‘SAVE OUR EARTH’ BOARD GAME

A TEAM of academics from the Laboratory of Product Development and Innovation (Prodev), Department of Industrial Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Indonesia (DTI FT-UI) introduced an interactive science game for children aged 6-10 years, named “Save Our Earth (SOE) Board Game “.

Research chaired by Dr. Ing. Amalia Suzianti produces an educational board game with the theme of climate change which is packaged in an interesting and interactive way with the hope of increasing children’s environmental awareness and giving them more insight into climate change.

As part of the community service and empowerment program, the team consisting of FT-UI Prodev Laboratory assistants, namely: Adhwa Rana, Tamara Rizkiputri Herdiani, Arsy Hanifa, Juandito B. Irianto, and Faza Azaria donated the game to several schools. elementary school (SD) in the Depok area as part of the science learning material.

According to Amalia, the making of the S.O.E board game departed from the team’s desire to increase effectiveness and build community knowledge and capacity regarding climate change by targeting subjects who did not understand the urgency of climate change, in particular, students in elementary school.

“We want to build children’s knowledge from an early age using an approach that leads to climate change prevention measures itself. We hope that children will not only avoid behaviors that lead to further climate change, but also instill the urgency of the issue so that they can grow as future changemakers,” Amalia said in official press release recently.

She explained that the work pattern of the S.O.E board game is vocal and visual interactive. There are 10 questions and students start playing from number 1 by paying attention and carrying out the instructions provided, then students answer the questions that appear on the screen. Students press the red button if the answer is A and the blue button if the answer is B.

“After answering, an animated video will appear on the screen explaining the answer to the question. Participants then proceed to the next question until the last question. Initially, the Prodev Community Service Team planned to conduct tests on elementary students located in Depok,” Amalia noted.

She underlined that due to the COVID-19 pandemic which caused schools to go online, the team decided to conduct the test by visiting 15 students who live in Jakarta. The students who were the research subjects were asked to operate the board game and answer several questions.

The results showed the students could enjoy the S.O.E board game well and they gained new knowledge by playing. The testing phase lasts for a week from 16 November 2020.

Amalia added that the purpose of community service and empowerment is to develop interactive learning media in science subjects, especially related to climate change and its impact on life by delivering material vocally and visually.

“This activity was held with grant support from the Directorate of Community Service and Empowerment (DPPM UI). In its implementation, the FTUI Prodev Team runs online and offline methods while adhering to all existing health protocols. One of them is by limiting the number of teams and participants who attend in order to maintain safety and health,” she concluded. [traveltext/id/photo special]