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" Spacewalk is a new multiplayer game in which players explore the International Space Station. The game is a free-form game. Spacewalk players take on the roles of astronauts in the International Space Station. You can download the game to use on Windows, Mac, or Linux computers. If you're a Windows user you can control your player with an Xbox 360 controller. Other players will have to use the their keyboards to control their players."

"Gaming is an amazing strategy to use in the classroom, yet few teachers use it to increase their students' learning. Generally it is used a 'reward' or dismissed as purely fun, with no learning purpose. Gaming, however, is a wonderful way to re-engage students with learning and make learning relevant to their lives. This is not to say that it should be the only teaching strategy that you should use, or that all topics would be best taught through gaming. Many learning situations, however, can be dramatically improved through introducing gaming to your classroom."

"Last month, the Institute of Play released a 160-page whitepaper on successfully designing and implementing video games as classroom assessment tools. It is widely hoped that the Institute's study, along with further research by SRI, will prove conclusively that cognitive skills are significantly improved by playing educational video games. This was not news to the math education community, which has known about the benefits of games in the classroom for a long time. Back in 2004, a study by Tisa Lach and Lynae Sakshaug had already shown that middle school students made significant improvements in algebraic reasoning, spatial sense, and problem-solving abilities after playing biweekly sessions of popular tabletop games such as Connect Four, Mastermind, Rush Hour, and Guess Who. "

"The MindShift Guide to Digital Games and Learning started as a series of blog posts written by Jordan Shapiro with support from the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop and the Games and Learning Publishing Council. We've brought together what we felt would be the most relevant highlights of Jordan's reporting to create a dynamic, in-depth guide that answers many of the most pressing questions that educators, parents, and life-long learners have raised around using digital Games for learning. While we had educators in mind when developing this guide, any lifelong learner can use it to develop a sense of how to navigate the Games space in an informed and meaningful way."

"Minecraft is a cultural phenomenon. The block-based exploration and crafting game was snapped up by Microsoft for $2.5 billion last year and has helped inspire competitors from giant toy companies like Lego. Even the government is interested in building on Minecraft's success: The Department of Education is helping fund a project known as "Eco" that looks a lot like Minecraft, except with a few added twists: There's a looming ecological disaster and players must band together to make a community -- agreeing on laws and living in harmony with the environment. If they fail, the world dies forever. Strange Loop games, the company behind the game, describes it a "global survival game" and says failure results in "server-wide perma death.""

"I have been designing an Operation-type board game that uses the MaKey MaKey to interface with a computer running Scratch. I started with a simple prototype left over from my squishy circuit Operation game. I was curious whether the MaKey MaKey would read a closed circuit on this hardware. Good news: it works! Connect an alligator clip cable from the MaKey MaKey to the game board's foil "game port." Connect the MaKey MaKey board's Earth port to another alligator clip cable."

"Habitats is a fun little game from the Smithsonian Science Education Center. The online game challenges elementary school to match animals to their habitats. The game shows students images representative of four habitats; desert, coral reef, jungle, and marsh. Students drag pictures of animals from a list to their corresponding habitats. Students receive instant feedback on each move they make in the game. Once an animal has been placed in the correct habitat students can click on it to learn more about it in the Encyclopedia of Life."

"Build a fort! A treehouse! A fort on top of a treehouse surrounded by a moat filled with molten lava! Children are endlessly fascinated by what we adults considered mundane and their imagination truly knows no limits. Children are the best builders in the world and can use any building material in order to create the most vivid worlds. And now, there are building apps for kids so they can hone their building skills in a virtual world. Building games are a great outlet for kids who enjoy doing solitary, creative work and then wish to test their concepts in practice. Unlike a shooting or a racing game, a 3D building game rewards patience, planning and thinking ahead. Through a building game, a child gains confidence, achieves a sense of accomplishment and develops in itself a sense of pride through the development and application of its own ideas, plans and thoughts."

"Edudemic has covered game-based learning and gamification in the classroom on numerous occasions in the past. When learning becomes a game, it's an enjoyable, effective experience for students and teachers alike. We've curated 23 of the best game-based education resources for 2014. If your class hasn't gotten its game on yet, then now is the time."

"Factitious is a game for testing your skill at identifying fake and misleading news stories. The game was developed by the American University game Lab and the American University's School of Communication. I learned about the game last month when Larry Ferlazzo featured it and I have since shared it in a couple of professional development workshops. It was a hit in both workshops in which I shared it with teachers."

"HERE ARE FOUR NEW BREAKOUT EDU GAMES THAT ARE PERFECT FOR BACK TO SCHOOL! We hope you had a great summer relaxing and readying yourselves for another awesome school year ahead. We have added all of these new GAMEs, as well as last years' back to school GAMEs, to the Featured GAMEs "

"Have you ever played a name game with your new classes? Typically everyone stands in a circle and the first person says their name, the next person says their own name and the name of the first person, and the third person says their own name, the name of the second person, and the name of the first person, and so on. Can you imagine how the last person in the group feels? There's so much pressure to remember everyone's names. Over the years, name games have been a go-to tool for me when learning the names of students. I noticed that my students and I learned names faster through name games. Now, however, I approach these games differently."

"This is a roundup of some of best gaming content on iPad.AppStorm, from casual arcade games that pass the time to games that really make you think, from huge franchise blockbusters to beautiful independant titles, get ready to play with your iPad again!"

"I've started a list of educational iPad game apps for parents. I've got a special affinity for these games as I originally started my career in technology as a first generation educational software designer. The list contains casual, fun games to use at home. They don't necessarily help you master long division or prepare for an upcoming geography test. The accent is primarily on having fun. If your child isn't going to enjoy playing then the app won't make the list. The second important criterion is that time spent playing is productive and that something of value is learned while playing the game."

"School is a time in a students life where they are learning as much about how to be students and operate successfully in a school as they are about how to read, write, and think. But oftentimes, the demand for pure academic instruction and practice can fly in the face for a student's need-at any age-to play, build, interact, explore, and construct their own learning experience. Issues like these can make mobile technology like tablets a boon to learning, as they can allow individual access to the right app-and the right content, creative opportunity, game, or learning simulation-at the right time. It is the collision of the need for interaction, personalization, creativity, and constant feedback that can make video games powerful tools for learning-and the following 38 games, curated by Sam Gliksman-and excellent place to start. "

"Using games or game play elements in the classroom to drive learning outcomes is sill gaining popularity. Though most teachers aren't ready to embrace bringing serious games like Minecraft into their classrooms, many are willing to gamify learning or use other types of games. That said, getting an idea of how many teachers are (or aren't) using gamification (or are interested in doing so) is a somewhat difficult task: Many people define gamification in different ways, when it may be a more accurate description to identify different levels of gamification. The handy infographic below takes a look at gamification and more 'serious gaming' in organizational learning. It offers some interesting statistics on just what types (or levels) of gamification are happening in classrooms. Keep reading to learn more!"

"Since its release in 2009, Minecraft has sold millions of copies worldwide revolutionizing thus the gaming industry and providing game players with an endless world of possibilities. As a sandbox construction game, Minecraft has successfully and distinctively set itself from the crowd by incorporating the ethos of 21st century learning that include: creativity, challenge, problem solving, and strategic thinking all of which are adeptly adapted to the player's little gaming world. Minecraft provided players with the tools and resources to construct their own gaming reality and test their creative possibilities. In a relatively short time, Minecraft succeeded in marking a strong presence within the education sector  and became one of the leading educational learning platforms for students. As a culmination of its sweeping popularity among the educational community, Minecraft recently released  Minecraft for Education which is a website geared primarily towards providing teachers with a forum where they can share their ideas about how they use Minecraft in their teaching. Given this growing potential of Minecraft in education, we decided to compile the list  below featuring some of the best reads on Minecraft. These books will help you learn more about how educators are using Minecraft as a powerful instructional tool to engage students and teach different subjects."

I truly believe gaming and game-based learning has a lot to offer our students. I hope this has provided an alternative perspective on gaming, and an insight into what our kids are learning through game-playing.

Two New Free Games! Just in time for the Holiday Season - two brand new Games! Test-N-Teach (TNT) is our new spelling Game and Read-A-Word is our first-ever reading Game. Both Games are available to everyone!

"Jean Piaget once said that "play is the answer to how anything new comes about." As educators in the digital age, it is important that we embrace the power of play in our classrooms. One of the ways that we can redefine our practice is by using game education in our schools. game education is a powerful way to engage 21st century learners in a variety of cognitively complex tasks that lead to deeper levels of understanding. Educational games help students to learn about certain subjects, expand their thinking on specific concepts, and reinforce skill development while they play while increasing engagement, empathy and excellence in the classroom."