C. Stephanidis and M. Antona (Eds.): UAHCI/HCII 2013, Part III, LNCS 8011, pp. 241–249, 2013. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013 Ludic Engagement Designs: Creating Spaces for Playful Learning Eva Petersson Brooks Centre for Design, Learning and Innovation, Department for Architecture and Media Technology, Aalborg University Esbjerg, Niels Bohrs Vej 8, 6700 Esbjerg, Denmark ep@create.aau.dk Abstract. The learning within and the design of a learning (or therapeutic) situation constitutes a situated activity with inherent actions and interventions. The participant profile influences the facilitator’s decisions on how to set up the attributes of the environment relative to the desired learning process and the ex- pected outcome of that process. This paper presents a model which was devel- oped relative to the development, use and evaluation of interactive spaces for playful learning. However, the model has a more generic value as it has been used in learning situations where other forms of resources and/or methods have been used. Thus, the general results upon which the present model is created, in- dicate that a playful learning tool may be construed by an open-ended design, in the sense that its (im)material affordances should in a flexible way support inclu- sion of different forms of emergent interaction and forms of play. Keywords: playful learning, design, semiotic interplay, facilitation. 1 Introduction This contribution introduces the concept of ‘Ludic Engagement Designs’ [1, 2]. The body of work includes an emerged model for design and intervention that transcend and cross-inform in learning and rehabilitation situations. The term ‘Ludic’ relates to the designed for fun/playful participant-experience for both participant (learner) and facilitator (teacher/healthcare professional). ‘Engagement’ refers to the targeted im- mersion of the participant that is achieved through the adaptation of the available environment design features so that personalisation is optimised and, thereby, creating attention and consistency through agency and by means of navigation; a semiotic interplay. In other words, ludic engagement designs include the creation of spaces for playful learning. The paper discusses affordances of interactive environments targeting learning and rehabilitation situations as well as the participants’ playful engagements and inherent semiotic interplay. In doing so, the author will use examples from a wide range of empirical material (observations, video recordings, interviews) where interactive en- vironments have been used for learning and training in the contexts of schools, muse- ums and rehabilitation. The participants are children and young people; typically