Geeks in Washington State rejoice, for Dungeons and Dragons is now available in every library system in the state. This brings the wonder and educational value of Dungeons and Dragons to young players, elderly players, the unhomed, and everyone one else in the state. This is a significant win for advocates for RPGs in educational settings, but there is more work to be done.
The recent press release from the Washington Secretary of State (Steve Hobbs) was released in collaboration with Wizards of the Coast Head of D&D (Dan Rawson). In their announcement, they revealed that 75 “Dungeons & Dragons Library Kits” have been donated, making the game available to every library system in the state. The first kit will be delivered on March 21st by Secretary Hobbs himself, at an appearance at Yakima’s Richard E. Ostrander West Valley Community Library. Each Library Kit includes a Starter Set, ready-to-play character sheets, a demo adventure, organizer instructions, a learn-to-play guide for Dungeon Masters, and promotional materials including a library poster and flyers for players. These resources not only make the game available for play, but help libraries build engagement with their community of prospective players.
Why Does it Matter?
At first glance, it may seem arbitrary or even counterproductive to celebrate games coming into educational facilities like libraries. But when you look closer, there is a lot of value in playing Dungeons and Dragons, including critical thinking skills, reading and comprehension, mathematics, social skills, and even communication skills with people of different ages and backgrounds. It can be a great way to boost your kid’s progress in a number of fields while they enjoy themselves, stay invested in learning the skills, and enjoy an immediate payoff for mastering those skills to reinforce their learning. In addition, since this donation is to the library system rather than to schools, adults can also enjoy the enrichment to the community, meet new neighbors, and connect with peers and non-peers alike.
How Do I Know it is Educational?
I could write countless articles about the various ways that D&D can improve learning, comprehension, and retention goals. But I won’t, because that fact has been discussed at length. No, really. A lot of articles. For me, it comes down to personal experience. As an undiagnosed autistic kid, I had very few friends, I consistently performed poorly in mathematics classes, and my dyslexia was making it increasingly difficult to learn and pay attention to new skills. I learned to overcome each of these challenges through Dungeons and Dragons gameplay, so I’ll show a few of those examples.
New Friends!
The first thing Dungeons and Dragons did for me was introduce me to new people. I was pretty skilled at speaking with adults, but had a terrible fear of speaking to my peers. Through roleplaying various experiences in which characters would often present an idea or advocate for an action that they personally wouldn’t do, I felt safer being more honest about myself, because I was playing “a character.” In time, I learned to roll this experience over into “real” life, learning how to approach and befriend new people, and to be more authentic in the process.
Maths!
Most people with a passing familiarity with Dungeons and Dragons will know there is a lot of addition and subtraction practice. But for seasoned players, calculations of much larger magnitude often arise. For example, if you’re casting a spell which creates a 5-foot radius sphere, how many creatures can you hit with that? Can smaller creatures walk around the edges without touching it? Is it better to cast it at ground level, so the equator of the sphere can touch the most people, or do you cast it higher, potentially missing some creatures on the ground in order to hit creatures flying overhead? These bits of maths helped me contextualize the grounding principles of radius, diameter, and circumference, as well as improving my ability to imagine the effects of maths in real space.
Other calculations come into regular use in my games, including odds and statistics. Is it better to use an attack that deals 2d4 damage or 1d12? Is it better to roll a d20 at disadvantage for a check with a +8 modifier, or roll one at advantage with a -2 modifier? This kind of critical thinking can be assessed at the table, but it is also the kind of thing a learner can take home, or take to the tutoring lab, in order to learn lessons more comprehensively, while simultaneously reinforcing the lessons learned.
New Words!
I started reading very young, and had a college-level reading comprehension in the 3rd grade, but I had a wrench in the gears: dyslexia. It might seem odd, and in fact took some time to have diagnosed, to have dyslexia with a high comprehension level. But my dyslexia mostly made itself known when I spoke aloud. Because I can’t be sure of the sequence of letters, I learned to sight read, memorizing the shape of the typed word, rather than the characters. This came with a cost, however, because I struggle to sound out new words. Because I learned to sight read, and didn’t discuss my reading with my peers, I never practiced the pronunciation of advanced vocabulary words. But what does a wizard need to do in order to cast a spell? They naturally need to tell others the spell they are casting.
Prestidigitation, antipathy, thaumaturgy, and transmutation were all words that I could read, write, and define long before playing Dungeons and Dragons in high school. But I couldn’t say any of them out loud. I probably used the word transmutation for 15 years in written form exclusively before I had to say it out loud when describing my roleplay interactions. Even beyond verbal mastery, using these words in new contexts helped me apply old concepts to new situations, making it easier to understand conversations, try new skills, and explore the world through communication.
Reality Check
Just to add a dose of reality here, I did want to point out a few details. Firstly, there are thousands of libraries in Washington State, meaning that the statement that every “library system” will have access is perhaps an overstatement of the level of access. At any given time, there will only be 3% of individual libraries with a kit in hand. This is still a huge donation on behalf of Wizards of the Coast, considering the next best thing is special licenses for DnDBeyond’s digital content. I just don’t want anyone to lose sight of the fact that access to roleplaying games is still limited, despite the consistent evidence of educational value.
What You Can Do
If you want to make sure that kids have access to educational entertainment materials in other states (or expand access in Washington), encourage your school’s teachers to get educational licenses and materials directly from the Dungeons and Dragons website. You can also send messages to the Wizards of the Coast folks encouraging them to make more After School and Library kits available, as well as encouraging your local government to partner with Wizards the same way that Secretary Hobbs has. Only by speaking up can we create the changes we want to see in the world, and Wizards of the Coast is setting an example that I hope other companies and their consumers strive for. Alternatively, you can donate materials to your local library or school, such as the Essentials Kit. However it is done, anything that improves the education and engagement of our students is a service to our entire society.
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