Momentous Day

Yesterday was a most momentous day:  First I held my first 90-minute Adventure Games Class AND my after school Strategy Games Club reconvened for the new school year!  That's a lot of cool stuff for a day of public school and my head is still spinning a bit.

Some highlights:

• My opening slide for Adventure Games Class was (and could only have been) this ...

• My class played "Table and Chair Olympics" to get used to shifting my room from dull old institutional rows to groups and back, both quickly and quietly.

• We started "Lights Out!" our course pre-assessment, where kids were challenged to use things like a toilet, a box of dry macaroni, and an electric iron to help them meet basic needs during a month-long blackout.

• 28 young people showed up after school for Strategy Games Club ... and that number will likely grow if prior years are any indication!

• I got to try out my new D&D 5th edition boxed starter set with a group of four seventh and eighth graders.  We used the pre-generated characters and started off playing Lost Mine of Phandelver ... I've challenged myself to try and run it by-the-book so that I can give the newest edition a fair test drive.

I wonder if this had come out when my oldest was 6 if I would have gone with it instead of B/X?
Probably not, but it is a fine little game so far as I can tell.

• In our first D&D session, within 2 minutes of hearing the set-up/adventure hook, my players decided that if the dwarf could afford to pay them 10 gold each to transport the supplies that the supplies must be worth a good deal more than that ... so the logical thing to do would be to steal the wagon, sell the supplies, and pocket the profits ... apparently old school gaming is alive and well ...

• Elsewhere in the room games of Munchkin, Jumanji, Settlers of Catan, Labyrinth Lord/Dagger for Kids, and The Adventurers: Pyramid of Horus were run ... without any rage-quitting.  One of these games probably marked the highlight of some kid's day!