DeKALB – This summer, the Digital Convergence Lab at Northern Illinois University will offer video game design camps for middle school and high school students.
The seven camps, each a week long, will be offered from mid-June through early August. Camp offerings are designed for students in grades five through nine.
The schedule follows:
• June 11 – Just for Girls! Video Game Design (day camp)
• June 18 – Minecraft and Video Game Design (day camp)
• June 24 – STEM Video Games Camp (high school residential camp)
• July 9 – Robotic Programming and Video Game Design (day camp)
• July 16 – Python and PyGame Video Game Design (day camp)
• July 22 – STEM Video Games (middle school residential camp)
• July 29 – STEM Careers Video Games Design (high school residential camp)
Day camps are priced at $250 a week, residential camps $650.
Each of the one-week camp sessions focuses on a particular game, tool or design software, but they are united by common skills and goals. In each, students will learn the essentials of video game design – from developing a game story and characters to designing the game interface, sounds, goals and rules.
With many teachers supporting each camp (about a 4-to-1 student-to-teacher ratio), the students will be able to work independently on their games and teachers will step in to answer questions and troubleshoot when needed.
Registration and information about video game coding camps is available online at www.dcl.niu.edu/ or by phone at 815-753-0673.
A list of summer camps is available at www.niu.edu/summercamps.