Right Opinion: Fidelity and Learning Design in a Food Poisoning Card Game

This paper describes the design of "Right Opinion," a two-player card game for Key Stage 3 learners (ages 11-14) that teaches the causes, symptoms, treatment, and prevention of food poisoning from E. coli, Salmonella, and Listeria. It is the card-based baseline of a planned five-format study (card, board, 2D digital, 3D digital, and virtual reality) examining whether the delivery medium affects immediate knowledge acquisition and player experience. The paper's central concern is how two pages of static source material can be transformed into playable mechanics, with cases requiring interpretation, committed responses, peer Challenges, optional Second Opinions, and immediate corrective feedback, all mapped to four learning outcomes drawn from Bloom's taxonomy.

The design was developed through an iterative process from a handwritten speed-based prototype, which was discarded because pacing conflicted with the interpretive demands of the learning outcomes, to a professionally printed version. The final game comprises 12 patient cases, a 34-card set, and a scoring model that separates primary diagnostic accuracy from competitive score. The author argues that cards offer tactile, face-to-face, low-cost, and portable play, but that they also require players to manage feedback and scoring manually and cannot record errors automatically. These observations are design findings from the author's own play-throughs; no learner data have been collected.

The paper acknowledges several limitations. The three-bacteria scope is deliberately narrow and may allow players to succeed through recognition of familiar food cues rather than full interpretation, and repeated play may encourage memorisation. Points may also overshadow reasoning, which the planned protocol addresses by requesting a brief justification for each Challenge. The planned evaluation, a one-hour classroom session with matched knowledge tests before, midway through, and after play, will be preceded by a pilot and is limited to immediate acquisition, as delayed retention is beyond current capacity. The paper concludes that the card medium supports active reasoning and social feedback, and that cross-format comparison requires a documented instructional core, but whether the game improves learning remains untested.