Designing an educational music game: What if children were calling the tune?

This paper presents the design process of an educational digital music game that offers primary school children a first experience with music education. A four-phased Participatory Design (PD) trajectory was followed: exploratory interviews, Proxy Technology Assessment using the MemoLine instrument, co-design sessions and evaluation of the first demonstrator. This paper describes how PD principles can be used in obtaining design requirements for educational digital music games for children. The results highlight children's desired game features for an educational music game. These include a clear feedback loop, a reward structure based on performance and persistence, chunking of learning content, an autonomous learning path, room for creativity and providing a 'private' practice space while allowing public performance.