Although there were many great topics covered throughout OLTD 508, for me, I really found James Paul Gee and his 13 principles of learning in relation to games to be very powerful. Often, throughout my educational career, I have had parents and colleagues question me about the education relevance of students playing video games. It was difficult to really give parents and colleagues a strong or concrete answer. James Paul Gee provides several concrete examples of how video games can benefit learning. According to James Paul Gee video games allow students to customize the difficulty levels and solve problems in a different way (2013). The key being students are learning to solve problems by solving problems. A problem leads to good learning when the player feels a challenge and there is a sense of accomplishment when they put some effort into the problem and solve it (Gee, 2013). In addition, video games provide students a “safe place” in a protected environment that allows them to explore, take risks, try things without immediately being in danger, being judged sorted or ranked (Gee, 2013).
Throughout my career, I have always be on the lookout for ways to enhance my teaching and finding ways to enhance the learning potential of my students. Video games should be used and leveraged in the classroom because learning becomes self-directed. I am certainly going to find ways to incorporate the use of video games into my f2f learning environment. When I can allow students chose the games they want to play, make their own decisions within the game and accept the outcome or consequences of their decisions (Socol, 2009), I will be allowing them to step outside of the one size fits all approach to learning. This one size fits all approach to learning has been in place for decades and does not work for all students. Furthermore, that video games should be used and leveraged in the classroom is because “failure has no costs”. When a character dies in a video game or loses a life, the student does not get punished, yelled at or receive a failing grade. Thus, the cost of failure is low. Students are willing to try again when the cost of failure is low, but when you raise the cost of failure, like in a typical classroom, students will give up and stop trying (Socol, 2009).
As I see great potential for the use of video games in education, I do see some obvious challenges to using video games within my place of work. First of all, I would like to set up and use Minecraft and MinecraftEdu with my grade 5 students, but I know that I will be challenged with finding the dollars to pay for the accounts. As I continue to learn more about technology and the educational benefits of technology, I find more and more sites that I would set up for my students. Most of these site (Mathletics, Bitstrips etc.) require student accounts to be purchased, set up and managed. With dwindling school budgets, who is going to pay for the accounts. Additionally, with multiple account set up, what time commitments will be required to set up, monitor, trouble shoot and manage the accounts? Some other challenges I see in the evolution of game based learning are trying to keep up with learning all the new technologies that are being developed. This may not be the case for the tech savvy teacher who has the time and the resources to do so. Also, many parents do not have the tech skills to support their children in online gaming environment.
As I do not have a lot of experience with apps or mobile devices, I found it challenging and less interesting learning about them. As my school has no wireless access and a very limited number of iPads, I find it difficult to invest a lot of time learning about them and trying to implement them. However, after learning about mobile devices and testing a variety apps in OLTD 508, there is a lot to be said about the use of personal mobile devices and how they can be used within an educational setting. After reading several articles, I am amazed that student engagement increased when they were allowed to use their own personal devices. For me as an educator, I need to let my guard down, allow students to bring their devices and find ways for to use the devices to support learning. Clack Quinn points out that it’s not about the devices, it’s about the capabilities and how we use the capability to provide learning (2008).
References:
Gee , J. P. (2013, November 13). 13 Principles of Game Based Learning [Web Video]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aQAgAjToz
Klingberg, T. (2009). Overflowing brain: Information overload and the limits of working memory. New York, New York: Oxford University Press.
Socol, I. (2009, April 117). [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://speedchange.blogspot.ca/2009/04/learning-video-games-and-cost-of.html
Squire, K. (Performer) (2013a, October 27). Video games & learning: week 1. video 2/8. YouTube. [Video podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzfY1N4FxsQ
Quinn, C. (2008). mlearning devices. Quinnovation, Retrieved from http://www.quinnovation.com/MobileDevices.pdf
Gee , J. P. (2013, November 13). 13 Principles of Game Based Learning [Web Video]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aQAgAjToz
Klingberg, T. (2009). Overflowing brain: Information overload and the limits of working memory. New York, New York: Oxford University Press.
Socol, I. (2009, April 117). [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://speedchange.blogspot.ca/2009/04/learning-video-games-and-cost-of.html
Squire, K. (Performer) (2013a, October 27). Video games & learning: week 1. video 2/8. YouTube. [Video podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzfY1N4FxsQ
Quinn, C. (2008). mlearning devices. Quinnovation, Retrieved from http://www.quinnovation.com/MobileDevices.pdf