Project-based learning in practice: The MIRAMI Method

Overview, impressions and inspiration.

At the beginning we were presented to the teachers and advisors that will teach/guide us during our training at TAMK. One teacher call my attention because in few words he presented himself and his role at VET mentioning terms like agile process, information systems, learning by doing, students motivation, etc. Immediately I became interested and anxious for understanding more about the project that has been developed and oriented to  BIS 1st year students.

The MIRAMI Method has been applied in 1st year students of Business Information System (BIS) Bachelor's Degree for 4 years. The MIRAMI Method has implemented an approach to unify courses from 1st year of BIS around the development of a complete game project. Altogether there are about 15 teachers involved with this project every year and they need to work together to reach satisfactory outcomes. Teachers have used some traditional lectures with collaborative approaches through blended learning focused in a common learning outcome. One principle I have appreciated in MIRAMI method is: "Coaching and team working more them teaching and individual working."

The student should deal with many abilities like leadership, autonomy, teamwork and others to succeed. The MIRAMI Method uses a Project-based learning approach combining principles of pedagogy, software development, management, gamification, coaching and others to motivate and engage the students through the development of a game from a demand of a real company. 

In IFPB context, we have faced to a high dropout rates of ICT students along the first year of their courses. The project I submitted to CNPq to develop in partnership with Finnish orientation try do find out solutions to this challenge. Being aware about MIRAMi Method has been a great inspiration to me. As Rami said, it is not an easy task to convince our colleagues to work together and try to transform our learning practices, therefore I think I could begin with one or two colleagues and attempt to reach innovative and successful learning outcomes. 

How has this course been operationalized?

The Business Information Systems is a 3.5 years course and the MIRAMI Method has been implemented only at the first year. At the first semester the students have been faced with some subjects that will support their work at the second semester. The teachers of the first semester have not only employed traditional lessons model, the students are encouraged to learning by doing and adopting collaborative tools.

At the beginning of the second semester, the students attend to a kick off day, when they need to decide their groups and apply for some roles, for example programmer, web designer, scrum master and others. Depending the role, the students should study specific subjects more deeply. In a informal talking with BIS students, they said the programmers have the possibility to attend to a intensified course of programming language Android. The teams just have between three and four months to design and develop the game.

BIS students study together the first year, after that, they need to choose a specialization among game production, software production, network services, web services and entrepreneurship, that must be studied on remaining 2.5 years of the course. At the final of the first year the students need to apply for a specialization and they are selected by their grades on 1st year. Considering that rivalry for a desired place, the competition climate sometimes is not healthful. On the other hand, the students said they learn to work as a team and it's quite common members of a team help colleagues from other teams when they are in trouble.

Learning SCRUM through a Game

We had two meetings to understand and reflect about the MIRAMI Method. Rami Lehtinen, the method inventor, gave us some explanation about BIS and the MIRAMI Method at the first moment. At the second, he planed a game to teach us about SCRUM, an iterative and incremental agile software development framework for managing product development. Rami divided everyone in groups of four. The groups should apply the SCRUM to solve some problems in a defined time. Group members should assume SCRUM roles and work as a team.

As I were familiarized with SCRUM, when Rami proposed the game I felt unmotivated, but for my surprise, the game was able to engage everyone on the SCRUM steps, including me. It was my first contact with a project-based learning in practice and we were part of that process. In my opinion, everyone could learn SCRUM by doing. Moreover, that situation was significant to get together the VET group.

We had a moment more to analyze what we had learnt and to deepen about SCRUM and MIRAMI Method. Rami showed us the games developed in 2015 and reinforce the invitation to GAME EXPO 2016. I've been amazed with the quality and creativity of the games, all them have been available on Google Store to download. The teams need to work so hard dealing with different competences related with game production, e.g, programming, web design, trailers creation, project management, deployment process, networking, innovation, etc. I could observe the students were too focused and motivated to present their games on  the GAME EXPO.