A review of five African board games: is there any educational potential?

ABSTRACT

Studies of African indigenous games often focus on a specific game or on games from different regions. This article, rather, examines five popular African board games in order to find the similarities and differences among these games. The analysis shows similarities among them. However, these similarities do not necessarily mean that these games are identical. The review of the games indicates that these games are different when elements such as rules and play are used to study them. This article also demonstrates that these board games are tools that can be integrated into the curriculum through a discussion of the educational affordance of each game. The article is an invitation to educators and game researchers to broaden the definition and exploration of game-based learning.

KEYWORDS:

• Board games
• curriculum
• game-based learning
• African games