Year Zero Economics: Using Edu-Larping to Explore Economic Systems in the Ninth Grade

This paper examines the design and classroom implementation of an educational live-action role-playing unit, or edu-larp, teaching basic economics to grade nine students in Alberta, Canada. Written by Ken Koziej and Mikael Hellström, the work describes how the economic mechanics of the tabletop game Mutant: Year Zero were adapted for a curriculum unit comparing the economic systems of the United States and Canada. The authors set out to meet three criteria proposed by Mochocki for edu-larps: that the unit be mono-disciplinary, knowledge-oriented, and teacher-friendly. The unit was delivered to three grade nine classes during a practicum, with the three classes' colonies sharing a single diegetic setting of post-apocalyptic Edmonton.

The adaptation process involved removing the game's mutant elements, simplifying the character sheet for a class of around eighty players, and building a map of Edmonton that students used to explore for resources. Students completed quests on the Rezzly platform, earning experience points that advanced their character skills, which tied academic assignments to in-game progress. Throughout the unit, students negotiated across classes, designed colony innovations such as sanitation systems and defenses, specialized in skills to improve cost-efficiency, and debated competing government systems, with one class adopting an oligarchic dictatorship and another direct democracy.

The authors report high student engagement and offer post-game observations suggesting deeper understanding of scarcity, resource allocation, and government decision-making. Exam results on multiple-choice and short-essay questions reportedly showed stronger grasp of scarcity than previous cohorts. The authors concede that the unit did not fully satisfy Mochocki's third criterion, since it demanded substantial preparation and its transferability to other teachers remains unproven. The evaluation is also limited: it was a post hoc assessment without a control group, and the authors call for further trials and adaptation for broader classroom use.