A group of Winamac Middle School students will be showing off their new “exergame” later this week.
Teacher Cody Hook says it’s part of the TECHFIT program that was introduced to the school by Purdue professors a couple years ago. “The whole idea of an exergame is for individuals or for students to come up with a game using different technology components and coding, web design, that type of thing – to develop a game where they can get physically active, but also implement technology,” Hook explains. “It’s about a nine-to-12- week course, and at the end of the nine-to-12-week course, they’re supposed to demonstrate their game that they developed in a showcase.”
This Friday, Winamac’s TECHFIT students will demonstrate their game to the entire student body, as well as judges from Purdue University. “Our game is called ‘Unstoppaball.’ It’s a mix between kind of a basketball game and kind of extreme Frisbee, where they have to throw the ball and try to get it to hit a net,” Hook says. “Then the ball bounces up off the net, and if the ball hits the ground, they get a point. Well, what we’ve incorporated a bit is different sensors and buzzers and lights and things like that to kind of make it a little bit more flashy for the audience. So they’ll be playing that game for the Purdue professors on Friday.”
Hook says the goal of TECHFIT is to get kids physically active, while also getting them interested in the STEM fields. He adds it was originally designed as an after-school program, but Winamac Community Middle School offers it as an elective course. Now, Hook says it typically attracts 35 to 45 students.
