The broad inquiry this workshop integrates has to do with preparing human groups and communities for effective response to change. Before our hands-on inquiry into social resilience, we engage in a series of readings and activities about resilience itself, and about the companion concepts of the commons, public policy, social dilemma, social capital, and governance (broadly defined by Seyle and King as "any system that humans use to make and enforce collective decisions") (21). My learning goals for the progression are these:

1) Better understanding of social resilience (what it is, why it matters, what calls it forth)
2) Increased motivation and enhanced conceptual "tools" for thoughtful response to selected social aspects of adapting to change
3) Improved capacities for analysis, synthesis, and metacognition

Social resilience is something more than the popular understanding of an individual "bouncing back" from adversity. Instead, social resilience can be defined as the capacity of a social entity of any scale from a single individual to a global population to adapt in response to sudden or gradual change, while continuing to fulfill that entity's purpose or function. (Research literature also refers to social resilience and closely related concepts as "community" or "cultural" resilience; academic knowledge about communal resilience is still developing.) Degrees of competence in the following three areas shape capacity for social resilience: social equity, relationships between people (social capital), and individual and communal capacities for learning.

Problems that require people to choose between their direct individual gain at the expense of others and the long-term good of the group, and that explore middle ground between those two points – in resource access and distribution situations, in particular – have important implications for communal preparation for and actual response to climate change. This workshop prompts participants to think critically about social resilience, and to draw learning from experience by reflecting on their engagement with a social dilemma modeled in the free print-and-play game Troubled Lands. Gameplay requires three players first each to adopt one of three unequal character roles, and then to manage 12 metaphorical plots of land held in common.

Because Troubled Lands can be played competitively, collaboratively, and independently in sequential sessions (described in more detail below), gameplay also provides opportunity for player/characters to explore the primary aspects of social resilience in a relatively low-stakes and hands-on setting that links to several governance approaches. For example, definitions of fairness and willingness to treat other players as peers (the social equity aspect of social resilience) are called into question by the changes in game goals. Player interactions on and off the board resulting from such qualities as trust, reciprocity, and sense of belonging (or lack thereof) provide content for reflections on social capital and its workings. And learning the game while learning about other players through game-focused conversation and play leads to strategic adaptations, and to metacognition about knowledge-making.

The general workshop structure could be used with many games to teach and explore a variety of concepts and ideas. I have taught variations of the social resilience workshop in several courses, each course centered on at least one of the following: introduction to policy-making and governance as an aspect of local community; strengthening the resilience capacity of a community in preparation for anticipated change, especially climate change; and design of analog serious games (games for learning).

Activities in the workshop sequence call on a variety of social and academic skills. Collaboration with peers and faculty may support students working at a lower-division level, while they grasp fully the ideas in the accompanying reading and later modify game rules. The game I've used for this activity, Troubled Lands Troubled Lands, is pitched to middle and high school students. Relative ease of gameplay is useful since observation of the social dynamics within a gameplay group requires some meta positioning to distance oneself from the play itself; a game that is easy to grasp allows participants to focus on strategy and interactions. The concepts associated with social resilience are useful for anyone considering equitable social adaptation to climate change, and players can understand these concepts at multiple levels of complexity. (A game playable by older elementary school students that can raise similar issues is Difference, designed by David Phelps.)

The activity as described below in Teaching Notes and Tips generally requires 5-6 in-class hours, for courses other than those focused on game design.

The workshop follows this sequence, after participants have demonstrated good working understanding of concepts of social resilience, social dilemma, social capital, the commons, public policy, and governance (for a course focused on social resilience):
1. Participants read the article "Revisiting the Commons: Local Lessons, Global Challenges," by Ostrom et al.
2. In-class seminar on article (60-90 minutes)
3. Game introduction (30 minutes)
4. Play of collaborative game with in-play reflection, short debrief (6 rounds per game; 45-60 minutes total)
5. Play of Troubled Lands competitive and independent games, each with in-play reflection, (6 turns per round; 75 to 90 minutes total)
6. Reflection and debrief of workshop overall (75 to 90 minutes)
7. Assessment of learning

Troubled Lands is available free in a print-and-play format, at Troubled Lands, and also can be purchased from The Game Crafter, an online publisher-on-demand. A full set of playing materials must be prepared for every three players.

While Troubled Lands lends itself well to the purposes of this workshop, a number of games available free online or commercially may serve related learning goals. In "Integrating Climate Change Mechanics into a Common Pool Resource Game," one of several articles focused on climate change games in a 2012 special issue of Simulation & Gaming, Fennewald and Kievit-Kylar discuss several such games (including their game The Farmers, a predecessor to Troubled Lands). Reckien and Eisenack survey the contemporary field of such games in the same issue. I've found useful Games for a New Climate: Experiencing the Complexity of Future Risks(Mendler de Suarez et al.) for exploring what the authors term "inhabitable games," defined as "playable dynamic models that can meaningfully engage people in experiencing complex systems—to better understand their current or potential role in transforming them" (9).

1. Participants read the article "Revisiting the Commons: Local Lessons, Global Challenges," by Ostrom et al.

I generally introduce this article with information about Ostrom's work and her emphasis on collaborative research, and provide this Reading Guide: Reading Guide (Microsoft Word 2007 (.docx) 356kB Jul28 17). Elinor Ostrom won the 2009 Nobel Prize in Economics for research with groups of people around the world who were (and are) managing relatively small resources – the irrigation water from a stream, the grass in local pastures – in ways that avoid damage to the resource over time. She followed this with theory regarding the conditions under which such resources can be sustainably governed. Ostrom's work provides a response to questions perhaps most famously raised by Garrett Hardin; depending on the course focus, students may also read Hardin's article "The Tragedy of the Commons."

2. In-class seminar on article/s (60-90 minutes)

Ostrom and the other authors of "Revisiting the Commons" argue that given certain conditions, people can and do manage resources sustainably over time. Key considerations in this seminar are grasp of information and ideas presented in the article, and of the relationship between article content and social resilience. Students may find counterintuitive the idea that people don't always act from short-term interest; faculty may find it useful to prompt reflection on situations and settings in which those present act unselfishly. Specific course content and context also may suggest some consideration of values and the role of values in decision-making.

3. Game introduction (30 minutes)

Facilitator familiarity with the game and game rules is a prerequisite for success. I strongly suggest that faculty play any game several times before using it in the classroom, and also take some time to imagine in advance which aspects of play your students might find confusing.

Troubled Lands (TL) requires players to manage plots of land held in common -- the playing grid or "board" of 12 cards -- by planting and harvesting crops, and responding to storms and resultant erosion. This premise and gameplay itself are fairly unusual to those familiar only with traditional board and card games; asking people to read the rules through will not be enough to prepare many of them for actual play. The online video online video introducing TL is a good supplement. I ask students to watch the video on their own before the class session in which we begin the first game.

I sometimes ask players to complete a values checklist keyed to the course focus, before beginning play. A question such as "When you think about resilient community, which of these matter most?", followed by a list of values students can prioritize, can be revisited with a second ranking after each game (or after the final game only). This provides information for reflection and discussion relative to the role of values and social expectations during decision making. Useful values inventories can be found on a number of web pages.

For the first game of TL, students form their own threesome, or faculty can randomly (or deliberately) assign game groups. Each group settles in with a full deck of TL cards, three character sheets (one each for the farmer, rancher, and lumberjack) and four scorecards for each player. The actions characters can take differ, and different characters score points differently. Faculty should check that each player has chosen a character, and then lead the class as a whole through setting up the playing grids (the "boards" of 12 cards). People will also find it useful to go over the parts of the scorecard as a group. Playing two or three collaborative rounds that don't count, in order to get a feel for what decisions must be made during a turn and for what each player role can do, minimizes confusion later. It's also helpful to ask individuals to mark one of their scorecards during these introductory rounds, so that they are more likely to remember to do so during the game. (People can start new cards when play for points begins.)

While being introduced to TL, my students occasionally have misunderstood these aspects of play: the difference between player actions and player points, on the grid on page 5 of the rules; sanctioning (everyone wants to give themselves points for administering a sanction instead of just revoking points from the player being punished); and the erosion aspect of the game. (Remind people that erosion applies to their land plots only as described in the rules.)

4. Play of collaborative game with in-play reflection, short debrief (6 turns per round; 45-60 minutes total)

Collaborative Game

In the collaborative mode, players at a single table (one game group) work together to amass the largest number of points they can, and to outscore all other tables. This is when players really learn the game and develop a sense of strategy and the interactions between players. (The rules forbid communication between game groups.)

In-Play Reflection

I try to make reflection during gameplay brief and useful; the point is to prompt attention to what is going on in the interests of more thoughtful play and of gathering information for performance analysis. In a recent course on resilience and communities, the following questions (here slightly modified) appeared on the back of each scorecard, for answering in writing after the third round of each game:

• One general principle or informal ground rule valuable to making good decisions in this version of Troubled Lands is:_______________ .
• Please write a key gameplay strategy for your character, for winning the version of Troubled Lands you are currently playing: _________________ .

Debrief

Note: Because of the inequities in character powers (different allowable actions and differing abilities to score points), participants may have made extra efforts to help each other during this collaborative round. Sometimes game group members define "help" as equalizing the score between characters (in which case the group loses to other tables); sometimes "help" means sacrificing one's own score in order to maximize that of the team (making winning possible).

Reflection for this round might begin with a check-in about play of the game itself, and then move to a dissection of strategy and decision-making. Equity is an important consideration: How did players at each table respond to the characters' various abilities to score points? Did the group talk about helping each other, and did that discussion result in specific actions? Thinking about fairness, relationships between players, and adjustments of strategy and sharing of information within each group as players learned the game, ties the experience to the three basic components of social resilience.

A number of sample debriefing questions, including several about decision making, can be found on the Pedagogical Materials page of the TL website Pedagogical Materials.

5. Play of Troubled Lands competitive and independent games, each with in-play reflection, (6 turns per round; 75 to 90 minutes total)
Note: You may choose to ask people to form new game groups, or keep groups the same. I've found that a switch before the final two games gives people a new start. If possible, playing the competitive and independent games during the same class session, or on consecutive days, allows participants to compare fresh memories of the two experiences.

Competitive Game

Evergreen students find face-to-face competition during learning activities to be a difficult undertaking; research on game-based learning suggests that this may be true in college classrooms generally. I ask participants to pretend that they are playing as the most competitive gamer they know or can imagine.

In-game reflection continues. When playing the independent game immediately after the competitive version, I keep the competitive debrief fairly short. Focus on the state of the land (playing grid of 12 cards) might be useful at the end of this game. What decisions and player interactions led to what's on the table? Would people make those same decisions again?

Independent Game

The tournament-style independent mode of TL requires a minimum of two table groups (six players). During play, players in each character role work to outscore other players in that role: Each farmer tries to earn a score placing in the top half of all farmers' scores, and so on. Each player's goal is to maximize their own points, in other words, while playing face-to-face -- and cooperating to keep jointly-managed plots of land producing -- with people with whom they are not in direct competition. Again, communication between tables is forbidden, although faculty may want to revise this rule. What would be different if all farmers were allowed to call out their scores after each round?

Independent play sets up an interesting experiential dynamic, "an in-game dilemma of two competing goods, one of which we must sacrifice . . . to the other" (Phelps, et al.) Troubled Lands designers intended this experience of felt social dilemma (in this game, tension between short-term personal advantage and long-term group good); their intent was to "simulate the experience and feeling of being a leader in an ecological political debate." (Fennewald and Kievit-Kylar "Research").

Asking participants to identify "independent" situations external to the game – times in their own lives when they face this type of decision – can widen their perspective on the experience of this type of play, and help them be more aware of gameplay decisions.

6. Reflection and debrief of workshop overall (75 to 90 minutes)

Note: When we are not able to debrief immediately after the final round of the game, I ask students to write an informal reflection paper applying at least one of the three social resilience aspects to gameplay, for discussion during the next class session.

A social resilience debriefing of gameplay might come from any of a number of angles, depending on course content. During various versions of TL, participants face game-world social dilemmas and experience the power of governance and social norms (in the form of game rules and expected modes of interaction, respectively) to shape actions. The state of each group's land (playing grid) at the end of a game can speak to all three foundational aspects of social resilience: social equity (player values and decision-making, including fairness and response to inequity), social capital (player interactions and relationships), and learning (knowledge made and acted upon). This compilation of sample questions for post-game debriefing and for workshop learning assessment comes from several courses: Sample Questions (Microsoft Word 2007 (.docx) 18kB Jul28 17)

Sivasailam Thiagarajan developed an influential six-question protocol for debriefing learning activities that moves from emotions to applying learning to the world outside the activity. Roger Greenaway's website Your Guide to Active Reviewing, and Scott Nicholson's article "Completing the Experience: Debriefing in Experiential Educational Games" provide additional approaches for reflection on experiential learning activities.

I've assessed learning using a variety of methods, including discussion, personal reflection writing (prompted and unprompted), essay questions, and in-game written debriefs. The idea of the commons is very often new to game participants, and they work during play to adapt previous ideas about ownership, decision-making, and resource access and distribution to this game-world reality -- in other words, to learn. Gameplay seems to support grasp of specific concepts and ideas and their implications, through experience and reflection. Play of Troubled Lands in social resilience courses also has resulted in student declarations of new insights into the strategic nature of public policy making and monitoring, and into the capacity more generally of public policy and governance approaches to shape social outcomes. Students usually evidence understanding of the complexity of determining equitable outcomes in the game when player/characters begin with unequal access to achievement. A frequent response to that complexity is an appeal to social capital, especially support for direct participation by all, as peers, in decision making (preference for either the collaborative or independent approaches).

A less conventional assessment method that has worked well while students are learning about public policy, and also in a game design course, involved asking students to revise the rules of the game to make it more conducive to learning related to social resilience, and then to explain their reasons for the rule changes. Proposing alterations to the game rules, for example, required participants to think about making social change by altering governance practices.

One intriguing assessment method I have not yet tried is taking a photo of a game situation during actual play at each table, and after the final debrief asking participants first to recall their feelings at the time the situation arose and then their subsequent strategy decision. People would then write about how this specific moment informed or provided an example of their learning related to selected course concepts (or to social resilience in general). An additional question about the move they would make now, at the workshop's end, could be used to bolster metacognition.

GAMES

Fennewald, Tom and Brent Kievit-Kylar. Troubled Lands, v. 2.0, 2014, https://troubledlands.wordpress.com/. Accessed 1 Jul. 2017.
Note: A full set of playing materials must be prepared for each threesome. The game is available free as print-and-play, and also for purchase in a publish-on-demand format.

Phelps, Davis. Difference: A Philosophy Game. Center for Philosophy for Children, University of Washington, n.d., http://depts.washington.edu/nwcenter/lessonplans/difference-a-philosophy-game/. Accessed 25 Jul. 2017.
Note: A full set of playing materials must be prepared for each threesome. The game is available free, in a print-and-play format. Organizers will need to supply a specified number of tokens.

WORKS CITED

Dawes, Robyn M., and David M. Messick. "Social Dilemmas." International Journal of Psychology, vol. 35, no. 2, Apr. 2000, pp. 111-116. EBSCOhost, DOI: 10.1080/002075900399402

Fennewald, Tom and Brent Kievit-Kylar. "Integrating Climate Change Mechanics into a Common Pool Resource Game." Simulation & Gaming, vol. 44, no. 2-3, 2013, pp. 427-451.

---. "Research." Troubled Lands: A Game of Sustainability, Inequality, and Community. https://troubledlands.wordpress.com/home/. Accessed 24 Jul. 2017.

Greenaway, Roger. Your Guide to Active Reviewing. http://reviewing.co.uk/index.htm. Accessed 24 Jul. 2017.

Hardin, Garrett. "The Tragedy of the Commons." Science, vol. 162, no. 3859, 13 Dec. 1968, pp. 1243-1248, http://science.sciencemag.org/content/162/3859/1243/tab-pdf. Accessed 30 Jun. 2017.

Mendler de Suarez, et al. Games for a New Climate: Experiencing the Complexity of Future Risks. Pardee Center Task Force Report, Boston University Library, 2012, http://hdl.handle.net/2144/22902. Accessed 30 Jul. 2017.

Nicholson, Scott. "Completing the Experience: Debriefing in Experiential Educational Games." The 3^rd International Conference on Society and Information Technologies, 2012, Orlando, FL, International Institute of Informatics and Systemics. http://scottnicholson.com/pubs/completingexperience.pdf. Accessed 24 Jul. 2017.

Ostrom, Elinor, et al. "Revisiting the Commons: Local Lessons, Global Challenges." Science, vol. 284, no. 5412, 9 April 1999, pp. 278-282. JSTOR Life Sciences Collection, DOI: 10.1126/science.284.5412.278.

Phelps, David, Ellen Jameson, Emily Sheepy, and Tom Fennewald. "No Game's Land: The Space Between Competition and Collaboration." Analog Game Studies, vol. 4, no. 2, 2 May, 2016, http://analoggamestudies.org/2016/05/no-games-land-the-space-between-competition-and-collaboration/. Accessed 24 Jul. 2017.
Note: Fennewald's dissertation Beyond Collaboration and Competition: A Case Study of Moral Foundations in The Farmers [a predecessor of Troubled Lands], A Cooperative Game with Independent Goals can be found at http://troubledlands.wikispaces.com/file/view/FennewaldFinalDissertationWithEdits.pdf/558051087/FennewaldFinalDissertationWithEdits.pdf.

Reckien, Diana and Klaus Eisenack. "Climate Change Gaming on Board and Screen: A Review." Simulation & Gaming, vol. 44, no. 2-3, 2013, pp. 253-271.

Seyle, D. Conor and Matthew Wilburn King. "Understanding Governance." State of the World 2014: Governing for Sustainability. Island Press, 2014, pp. 20-28.

Thiagarajan, Sivasailam. "Six Phases of Debriefing." Play for Performance. Feb. 2004. http://thiagi.net/archive/www/pfp/IE4H/february2004.html#Debriefing</a>. Accessed 24 Jul. 2017.

WORKS CONSULTED

SOCIAL EQUITY, SOCIAL CAPITAL, AND SOCIAL RESILIENCE

Babaei, Hamidreza, Nobaya Ahmad, and Sarjit Gill. "Bonding, Bridging and Linking Social Capital and Empowerment among Squatter Settlements in Tehran, Iran." World Applied Sciences Journal, vol. 17, no. 1, 2004, pp. 119-126. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/aeb5/2f38ecb57809fb2bf0d7e6814703c7a49539.pdf. Accessed 2 May 2017.

Eizenberg, Efrat and Yosef Jabareen. "Social Sustainability: A New Conceptual Framework."Sustainability, vol. 9, no. 1, 5 Jan. 2017. http://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/9/1/68/htm. Accessed 24 Jul. 2017.

Jones, Camara Phyllis. "Levels of Racism: A Theoretic Framework and a Gardener's Tale." American Journal of Public Health vol. 90, no. 8, 2000, 1212-1215. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1446334/pdf/10936998.pdf</a>. Accessed 1 Jul. 2017.

Ledogar, Robert J. and John Fleming. "Social Capital and Resilience: A Review of Concepts and Selected Literature Relevant to Aboriginal Youth Resilience Research." Pimatisiwin, vol. 6, no. 2, Summer 2008, pp. 25–46. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2956751/pdf/nihms761.pdf</a>. Accessed 8 Jul. 2017.

Mignone, Javier and John O'Neil. "Conceptual Understanding of Social Capital in First Nations Communities: An Illustrative Description." Pimatisiwin: A Journal of Aboriginal and Indigenous Community Health, 3(2), 2005, pp. 7-44. Retrieved 2 May 2017 from http://www.centroetnosalud.com/trabajos/ConceptualUnderstanding%20of%20Social%20Capital%20in%20Pimatisiwin.pdf</a> .

SOCIAL AND SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL RESILIENCE

Keck, Markus, and Patrick Sakdapolrak. "What is Social Resilience? Lessons Learned and Ways Forward." Erdkunde, Jan.-Mar. 2013, pp. 5-19.

Tierney, Kathleen. The Social Roots of Risk: Producing Disasters, Promoting Resilience. Stanford University Press, 2014.

Walker, Brian and David Salt. Resilience Thinking: Sustaining Ecosystems and People in a Changing World. Island Press, 2006.

Zolli, Andrew, and Ann Marie Healy. Resilience: Why Things Bounce Back. Simon and Schuster, 2013.