For some children conventional schooling can be challenging, but we know that gaming can play a vital role in their development. For years there have been outdated preconceptions that gaming is ‘just a form of entertainment’ and a ‘time drain’ on children's lives. However, studies show that it can help foster important life skills like problem solving, team building and analytical thinking. Xbox knew that gaming could play an active role in education, however there was still a lot of scepticism to its benefits from parents and teachers. We needed a way to bring to life the benefits of gaming, and the demonstrate the learning that could be harnessed through playing some of Xbox’s biggest gaming titles.

Xbox FIELD TRIPS is a first-of-its-kind learning module that reframes popular video games as educational tools. Working with a team of experts including teachers, ed-tech specialists, child psychologists, and games narrative designers we deep-dived into Xbox’s biggest gaming titles to unearth where education could be harnessed – and subsequently uncovered learning in the most unexpected places.

We designed an immersive experience that takes the shape of audio podcasts kids listen to whilst gaming. Each one takes them on a bespoke learning journey into games to help foster important soft skills like problem solving, team building, analytical thinking, and communication. Along each FIELD TRIP, they also absorbed curriculum-based learning that relates to the theme of the game - for example, discovering the history of piracy and tidal formations whilst playing the pirate adventure game, Sea of Thieves.

For the first time ever, Xbox wasn’t speaking to their core gamer audience. Instead, they were talking to parents and teachers - people who have maybe never picked up a controller in their life. These are the people who are most sceptical about the virtues of gaming. However, we know that gaming has come a long way since the days of Tetris and Pacman. Games now offer so much more than just entertainment. With the advent of open-world ‘sandbox’ games it offers kids a whole new level of immersive experience, and games do not have to be made for educational purposes to be educational. Xbox needed a campaign that could prove to parents and teachers that their kids can gain important life skills and learning from unexpected places. Xbox is one of the largest, un-tapped educational resources, and the only way to prove this was by doing, not just saying.

Xbox FIELD TRIPS featured audio podcasts for some of Xbox’s biggest games – they included Grounded, Sea of Thieves, PowerWash Simulator, Minecraft, Flight Simulator, Cities Skylines, and Age of Empires.

They launched exclusively on Spotify, where kids could access them via Xbox Dash. All they needed to do was search the playlist, select the preferred podcast, and load up the respective game title, and the narrator would them take them along an immersive and interactive journey into the game – setting challenges and relaying interesting knowledge relevant to the theme of the game.

Teaming up with gaming and parent influencers we demonstrated the FIELD TRIPS via live streaming, whilst also inviting schools into the flagship Microsoft store to experience them first-hand. The FIELD TRIPS launched in April 2024 in the UK and were also translated into Spanish and launched in the Mexican market, empowering more kids to learn through play.

To get the audio FIELD TRIPS in front of the right people, Xbox formed a ground-breaking partnership with UKIE and the Digital Playhouse, a trade body that uses play-based learning to engage the next generation of pupils and teachers with the computing curriculum. The partnership enabled the FIELD TRIPS to a permanent fixture within the education ecosystem, and accessible to over 200,000+ pupils in 2,000 schools.

The inclusion in the classroom was vital in changing the perceptions of gaming. Parents and teachers alike began to see the benefits that gaming can bring, whilst kids were able to learn in new, fun, and engaging ways. The FIELD TRIPS were a demonstration to the broader audience that learning can come from unexpected places, and that important skills that are vital for development are hidden within games.

To get the audio FIELD TRIPS in front of the right people, Xbox formed a ground-breaking partnership with UKIE and the Digital Playhouse, a trade body that uses play-based learning to engage the next generation of pupils and teachers with the computing curriculum. The partnership enabled the FIELD TRIPS to a permanent fixture within the education ecosystem, and accessible to over 200,000+ pupils in 2,000 schools.

The inclusion in the classroom was vital in changing the perceptions of gaming. Parents and teachers alike began to see the benefits that gaming can bring, whilst kids were able to learn in new, fun, and engaging ways. The FIELD TRIPS were a demonstration to the broader audience that learning can come from unexpected places, and that important skills that are vital for development are hidden within games.