How Youth Can Build Social and Emotional Skills with Tabletop Role-Playing Games

• The paper by foundry10, with Game to Grow, explores how tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) like Dungeons and Dragons can support social and emotional learning (SEL) in young people.

• Analysing virtual TTRPG sessions, the authors examine youth collaboration, SEL skill development, and interactions with facilitators.

• Facilitators play a key role as game masters, storytellers, referees, and teachers, guiding players and fostering SEL growth.

• Four main insights emerge: facilitators set tone and guidance; conflicts can enhance SEL development; youth benefit from support in complex reflection; and TTRPGs create a safe learning space.

• The paper concludes that TTRPGs are valuable for SEL skill development and suggests further research on their broader educational and therapeutic uses.

Dungeons & Dragons & Dewey: The potential for dramatic rehearsal and civic outcomes in tabletop role-playing games

• This paper by Susan Haarman considers TTRPGs as educational tools where players assume character roles, make decisions, and experience outcomes in a shared narrative.

• The author urges a call to educators to use TTRPGs to develop empathy, critical thinking, and social skills.

• Drawing parallels to John Dewey’s concept of Dramatic Rehearsal, TTRPGs help players imagine actions and consequences, fostering emotional and rational thinking.

• The author argues that role-playing characters enhance understanding of diverse perspectives and that having players collaborate to address challenges using creativity and adaptability, results in the practice of critical thinking and problem-solving. 

• The co-creative nature of TTRPGs offers lessons on adapting to change and collective problem-solving and encourages conflict resolution, negotiation, and teamwork, reflecting democratic citizenship.

Composition Pedagogy and Communal Benefits of Narrative Innovation

• This Master’s thesis by Aysel Atamdede explores how tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs) can support collaboration, creativity, and communication skills in composition courses.

• Atamdede argues that TTRPGs, though often seen as niche, have unique narrative structures well-suited for educational use.

• The thesis contrasts TTRPGs with traditional single-author narratives and digital games, using concepts like "choice poetics" and the "authorial combinatorics problem" to examine player agency in storytelling.

• Drawing from personal experience as a player and game master, Atamdede highlights the dynamic challenges of TTRPGs, where player choices continually shape the narrative.

• An Action Research Project (ARP) incorporated TTRPG-inspired assignments into a first-year composition class, showing increased student engagement and skill development.

• Atamdede concludes that TTRPGs have strong pedagogical value, promoting student agency, critical thinking, and engagement while challenging linear approaches to composition.

Increasing Social and Emotional Learning Competencies Through Use of Tabletop Role-Playing Games

• This dissertation proposal by Tia Ruff for a Doctor of Education degree at George Fox University examines the use of tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs), particularly Dungeons & Dragons, to enhance social and emotional learning (SEL) in upper primary students.

• Employing an "Improvement Science Dissertation in Practice" (ISDiP) framework, Ruff collaborates with a "Network Improvement Community" (NIC) of teachers, parents, and stakeholders to assess the impact of a tailored TTRPG intervention on students' SEL skills.

• Ruff argues that TTRPGs provide a dynamic platform for developing SEL competencies, such as self-awareness and responsible decision-making.

• The dissertation aims to validate TTRPGs as effective supplementary tools for SEL and to guide future SEL initiatives in the UK educational context.

Analysis of Dungeons & Dragons and tabletop roleplaying games as an oral, collaborative, and immersive genre of literacy

• This honours thesis by Olivia Haslett argues that tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs), especially Dungeons & Dragons, should be recognised as a new genre of literacy.

• The thesis compares TTRPGs to oral storytelling traditions, noting their immersive, interactive narration and collaborative authorship.

• It traces the shift from oral, collaborative narratives to the individual authorship of written texts, establishing links between TTRPGs and epics with non-linear narratives and shared characteristics.

• Haslett highlights the role of players and Dungeon Masters in shaping TTRPG narratives, focusing on the dynamics of immersive storytelling and collaborative authorship.

• The thesis advocates for viewing TTRPGs as a complex form of literacy that mirrors the values and intricacies of modern society.

Understanding How the Experience of Playing Dungeons & Dragons Impacts the Mental Health of an Average Player

• This research paper investigates the impact of playing Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) on the mental health of frequent players.

• Researchers conducted semi-structured interviews with ten participants and used reflexive thematic analysis to explore key themes.

• Identified themes include escapism, self-exploration, creative expression (such as providing for others), social support (creation of safe spaces), and routine.

• The authors discuss how these themes could be applied in therapeutic contexts to support mental well-being.

• The paper concludes by highlighting D&D's potential as a therapeutic tool when integrated with other forms of mental health support.