"bowling alone" hypothesis (Putnam, 2000), which suggests that media are displacing crucial civic and social institutions
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Where Everybody Knows Your (Screen) Name: Online Games as "Third Places" - 52 views
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According to Putnam, time spent with relatively passive and disengaging media has come at the expense of time spent on vital community-building activities.
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A core problem on both sides of the debate is an underlying assumption that all Internet use is more or less equivalent
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It would be more plausible and empirically rigorous, then, to consider how specific forms of Internet activity impact civic and social engagement as a result of their particular underlying social architectures
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combining conclusions from two different lines of MMO research conducted from two different perspectives—one from a media effects approach, the other from a sociocultural perspective on cognition and learning.
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By providing spaces for social interaction and relationships beyond the workplace and home, MMOs have the capacity to function as one form of a new "third place" for informal sociability much like the pubs, coffee shops, and other hangouts of old.
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They are known for their peculiar combination of designed "escapist fantasy" and emergent "social realism"
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from two research projects: one an examination of the media effects of MMOs, the other an ethnographic study of cognition and culture in such contexts.
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the assumption that the most fruitful advances are sometimes made when congruent findings are discovered through disparate means
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as a way to tease out what happens in the virtual setting of the game and how the people involved consider their own activities, the activities of others, and the contexts in which those activities takes place
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a reasonable level of generalizability (random assignment to condition in the first study) and contextualization (ethnographic description of existing in-game social networks and practices in the second)
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brick-and-mortar "third places" in America where individuals can gather to socialize informally beyond the workplace and home
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virtual environments have the potential to function as new (albeit digitally mediated) third places similar to pubs, coffee shops, and other hangouts.
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the default assumption is that no one person is compelled to participate legally, financially, or otherwise.
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Unless one transforms the virtual world of the game into a workplace (e.g., by taking on gainful employment as a virtual currency "farmer" for example, Dibbell, 2006; Steinkuehler, 2006a) or enters into such agreement, no one person is obligated to log in
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Yee's (2006) interviews also reveal that individuals who game with romantic partners or family find that such joint engagement in the "other world" of MMOs allows them to redefine the nature and boundaries of their offline relationships, often in more equitable terms than what may be possible in day-to-day offline life
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the relationships that play-partners have with one another offline are often "leveled" within the online world
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appeal to people in part because they represent meritocracies otherwise unavailable in a world often filled with unfairness
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"In all such systems, linguistic interactions have been primary: users exchange messages that cement the social bonds between them, messages that reflect shared history and understandings (or misunderstandings) about the always evolving local norms for these interactions" (p. 22).
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such that "one may go alone at almost any time of the day or evening with assurance that acquaintances will be there"
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accessible directly from one's home, making them even more accommodating to individual schedules and preferences
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"What attracts a regular visitor to a third place is supplied not by management but by the fellow customer,"
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"It is the regulars who give the place its character and who assure that on any given visit some of the gang will be there"
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As one informant satirically commented in an interview, "You go for the experience [points], you stay for the enlightening conversation.
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Oldenburg argues that third places are characteristically homely, their d�cor defying tidiness and pretension whenever possible. MMOs do not fit this criterion in any literal sense
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In neither of our investigations did the degree of formality exhibited by players within the game bear any relation to the degree of visual ornamentation of the players' immediate vicinity.
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Thus, while the visual form of MMO environments does not fit Oldenburg's (1999) criterion of "low profile," the social function of those environments does.
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Oldenburg (1999) argues that seriousness is anathema to a vibrant third place; instead, frivolity, verbal word play, and wit are essential.
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The playful nature of MMOs is perhaps most apparent in what happens when individuals do bring gravity to the game.
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Participation becomes a regular part of daily life for players and, among regular gamemates such as guild members, exceptional absences (i.e., prolonged or unforeseen ones) are queried within the game or outside i
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create an atmosphere of mutual caring that, while avoiding entangling obligations per se, creates a sense of rootedness to the extent that regularities exist, irregularities are duly noted, and, when concerning the welfare of any one regular, checked into
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Anderson (1991), who suggests that geographic proximity itself is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for the emergence and preservation of "community."
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Social capital (Coleman, 1988) works analogously to financial capital; it can be acquired and spent, but for social and personal gains rather than financial
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This form of social capital is marked by tentative relationships, yet what they lack in depth, they make up for in breadth.
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On the one hand, bridging social capital provides little in the way of emotional support; on the other hand, such relationships can broaden social horizons or worldviews, providing access to information and new resources.
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shows that bridging and bonding social capital are tied to different social contexts, given the network of relationships they enable.
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Virtual worlds appear to function best as bridging mechanisms rather than as bonding ones, although they do not entirely preclude social ties of the latter type.
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One could argue that, if the benchmark for bonding social capital is the ability to acquire emotional, practical, or substantive support, then MMOs are not well set up for the task:
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While deep affective relationships among players are possible, they are less likely to generate the same range of bonding benefits as real-world relationships because of players' geographic dispersion and the nature of third places themselves.
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Despite differences in theoretical grounding and methodologies, our conclusions were remarkably similar across complementary macro- and micro-levels.
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It is worth noting, however, that as gamers become more involved in long-term social networks such as guilds and their activities become more "hardcore" (e.g., marked by participation in large-scale collaborative problem-solving endeavors such as "raids" into difficult territories or castle sieges), the function of MMOs as "third places" begins to wane.
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It may be, then, that the structure and function of MMOs as third places is one part of the "life cycle" for some gamers in a given title.
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In such cases, MMOs appear to enable a different kind of sociability, one ostensibly recognizable as a "community" nonetheless.
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However, our research findings indicate that this conclusion is uninformed. To argue that MMO game play is isolated and passive media consumption in place of informal social engagement is to ignore the nature of what participants actually do behind the computer screen
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Perhaps it is not that contemporary media use has led to a decline in civic and social engagement, but rather that a decline in civic and social engagement has led to retribalization through contemporary media (McLuhan, 1964).
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Such a view, however, ignores important nuances of what "community" means by pronouncing a given social group/place as either wholly "good" or "bad" without first specifying which functions the online community ought to fulfill.
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Moreover, despite the semantics of the term, "weak" ties have been shown to be vital in communities, relationships, and opportunities.
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In light of Putnam's evidence of the decline of crucial civic and social institutions, it may well be that the classification "lacking bridging social capital" best characterizes the everyday American citizen. T
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Without bridging relationships, individuals remain sheltered from alternative viewpoints and cultures and largely ignorant of opportunities and information beyond their own closely bound social network.
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it seems ironic that, now of all times, we would ignore one possible solution to our increasingly vexed relationship with diversity.
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Executive Summary of Serious Games: Improving Public Policy Through Game-based Learning... - 17 views
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Ben Sawyer is the cofounder of Digitalmill, where he is in charge of strategy, technology, and business development. Located in Portland, Maine, Digitalmill is a technology development firm with clients worldwide. It has worked on a wide variety of projects dealing with interactive game development, including support for The Sloan Foundation's Virtual U game project. The company has produced two books on game development, numerous articles about developing games, and several market research reports on the gaming industry. Currently Digitalmill is working on Virtual U 2.0, and consulting on other projects that integrate gaming, education, and training. Sawyer has authored or co-authored more than 10 computer trade books as well as numerous articles on a wide range of technology areas including e-commerce, interactive game development, software marketing, and computer graphics. Publications include The Ultimate Game Developer's Sourcebook, published in 1996 by Coriolis Group Books. To find out more about the author, please visit: www.dmill.com Contact the author: bsawyer@dmill.com
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Does Easy Do It? Children, Games, and Learning - 29 views
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The kind of product I shall pick on here has the form of a game: the player gets into situations that require an appropriate action in order to get on to the next situation along the road to the final goal. So far, this sounds like "tainment." The "edu" part comes from the fact that the actions are schoolish exercises such as those little addition or multiplication sums that schools are so fond of boring kids with. It is clear enough why people do this. Many who want to control children (for example, the less imaginative members of the teaching profession or parents obsessed with kids' grades) become green with envy when they see the energy children pour into computer games. So they say to themselves, "The kids like to play games, we want them to learn multiplication tables, so everyone will be happy if we make games that teach multiplication." The result is shown in a rash of ads that go like this: "Our Software Is So Much Fun That The Kids Don't Even Know That They Are Learning" or "Our Games Make Math Easy."
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What is worst about school curriculum is the fragmentation of knowledge into little pieces. This is supposed to make learning easy, but often ends up depriving knowledge of personal meaning and making it boring. Ask a few kids: the reason most don't like school is not that the work is too hard, but that it is utterly boring.
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game designers have a better take on the nature of learning than curriculum designers. They have to. Their livelihoods depend on millions of people being prepared to undertake the serious amount of learning needed to master a complex game. If their public failed to learn, they would go out of business. In the case of curriculum designers, the situation is reversed: their business is boosted whenever students fail to learn and schools clamor for a new curriculum!
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watching kids work at mastering games confirms what I know from my own experience: learning is essentially hard; it happens best when one is deeply engaged in hard and challenging activities.
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The preoccupation in America with "Making It Easy" is self-defeating and cause for serious worry about the deterioration of the learning environment.
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I have found that when they get the support and have access to suitable software systems, children's enthusiasm for playing games easily gives rise to an enthusiasm for making them, and this in turn leads to more sophisticated thinking about all aspects of games, including those aspects that we are discussing here. Of course, the games they can make generally lack the polish and the complexity of those made by professional designers. But the idea that children should draw, write stories and play music is not contradicted by the fact that their work is not of professional quality. I would predict that within a decade, making a computer game will be as much a part of children's culture as any of these art forms.
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Gamestar Mechanic - 46 views
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a very popular web-based game design environment. Global Kids http://olpglobalkids.org/ is using it to run social benefits game design contests and badging programs. They are getting 100+ new game design entries per week. From the parents' guide: Gamestar Mechanic is currently supported by a partnership between the Institute of Play and E-Line Media. The game was originally developed by Gamelab in partnership with the Institute of Play and the Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Lab (AADLC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Initial funding for the game and companion learning guides came from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. The design of the game is based on research by some of the leading academics in the field including Katie Salen (Executive Director of the Institute of Play and curriculum author for the New York City Public School Quest To Learn) and James Paul Gee (author of What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy).
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This site has students creating games from scratch and putting them out into the world for feedback within the Gamestar Mechanic community. Students use math, problem solving, writing skills and more to make their games interesting. I think this could be used in the classroom as a theme-based project or just to get students interested in coding.
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Spelling & Vocabulary Website: SpellingCity - 68 views
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Over 42,000 spelling words with customizable sentences and definitions A REAL person who says each word and sentence Free home pages for teachers and parents to save lists Teacher training videos Free printable handwriting worksheets Free teaching resources with lists and lesson plans Twenty-five games to play online or to print such as
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Over 42,000 spelling words with customizable sentences and definitions A REAL person who says each word and sentence Free home pages for teachers and parents to save lists Teacher training videos Free printable handwriting worksheets Free teaching resources with lists and lesson plans Twenty-five games to play online or to print such as :Alphabetical Order, Unscramble, Parts of Speech, HangMouse, Crossword Puzzle, WordSearch, and Vocabulary Test. A free forum and newsletters
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Over 42,000 spelling words with customizable sentences and definitions A REAL person who says each word and sentence Free home pages for teachers and parents to save lists Teacher training videos Free printable handwriting worksheets Free teaching resources with lists and lesson plans Twenty-five games to play online or to print such as : Alphabetical Order , Unscramble , Parts of Speech , HangMouse , Crossword Puzzle , WordSearch , and Vocabulary Test . A free forum and newsletters
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SpellingCity.com has: - Over 42,000 spelling words and ten learning games! - A REAL person who says each word and sentence. - Free home pages for teachers and parents to save lists. - How To Videos to explain to teachers and parents how to use SpellingCity.com. - A free forum and newsletter with more vocabulary and spelling resources! - Ten spelling and vocabulary games to play online or to print. - Free printables for handwriting practice with your saved lists. - A Resources Section which highlights features and existing lists for Dolch words, compound words, sound-alikes (their, there, they're), contractions, possessives, and more. After taking the online spelling test, students can print out a report, retake the entire test, or get tested only on spelling words that they got wrong the first time. TeachMe spells and displays the word in ways that stimulate memory for visual and verbal learners. Printable Games include WordSearch, UnScramble, WhichWord?, Sentence UnScramble and MissingLetter. Printable Handwriting Worksheets for combined spelling and handwriting practice can be created from any saved list (this feature only works if the list is saved). Choices includes three sizes of lines, capitals or small letters, script or cursive, and with directional arrows on or off. How cool is that?
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All you have to do is type in the list of words and bam! at least 10 games are generated for the students! It also teaches and tests the students on the words. You can save the lists as a teacher and have students search for your lists or you can have students input their own lists without saving them.
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A superb resource where teachers can sign in and input spelling lists for pupils to learn by playing games. Give pupils the link and they don't need to sign in to use it. Site only recognises US spelling when generating example sentences, but you can input your own easily. Free option should be enough for most users, but 'paid for' option is available. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/English
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fractions idea bank - 141 views
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One way to help students to understand the basics of adding and subtracting fractions (denominators must be the same; add/subtract the numerators; DO NOT add/subtract the denominators) is to teach the students what the parts of a fraction really are: numbers and names. This also helps combat the frequently-taught but incorrect idea that a fraction and a ratio are the same. A ratio may look like a fraction, but it is not a fraction.
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FRACTIONS ARE AS EASY AS PIGS What is 2 pigs plus 3 pigs? 5 pigs (Write as a fraction: 2/pigs + 3/pigs = 5/pigs) Notice, we do not end up saying the answer is 5 horses.
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The top of a fraction is a NUMBER: 1, 2, 3, etc. The bottom of a fraction is a NAME: half, third, fourth, etc. We can add and subtract numbers. We cannot add and subtract names.
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Ask each student their "denominator." Don't give it away. Ask each one until one finally says their name. Continue through the room... Their name is their denominator. When you practice adding and subtracting fractions with like denominators, actually say "pigs" instead the fraction name. Then say, "Instead of pigs, we are using ..." and let them answer with the appropriate denominator. It is fun when doing subtraction to say, "If we have 5 pigs and eat 3 pigs, besides a stomachache, what is left?"
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Denominate means: to name Political parties nominate (name) their candidates. Religious denominations are identified by their names. The denominations of money are the names of the coins and bills.
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The transition to unlike denominators is automatic. If the names are not the same, you can't add the fractions. 2/pigs + 3 horses is still 2/pigs and 3/horses (unless we discover a "common denominator" -- a common name: farm animals). Once the students know they must have a common name (denominator) in order to add or subtract, they have a reason to learn about common denominators. By the way, I always begin common denominators without worrying about the Least Common Denominator (LCD). Once they can find a common denominator (multiply the denominators), add or subtract, and then reduce, they can be led to finding "easier" denominators to work with. Students who have too much difficulty with LCD can still get the correct answer; they just have more reducing to do. Those who can find a lower common denominator have less reducing. This is a very basic rendering of "Fractions are as easy as pigs." AWP, 10/12/00 on teachers.net math board
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One game that my students enjoy the challenge of is Blackjack 1. You need a set of fraction cards per student (or you can make them from index cards.) The same rules as Blackjack apply. Instead of trying to get to 21, they want to try and get close to 1 without going over. With this game they practice addition and comparing -- it's great. You can also make it more challenging or bring in mixed numbers with Blackjack 2 or Blackjack 3. (Blackjack 2 means to try to get as close to 2 as possible without going over.) I am not sure where to buy fraction cards. I have one set that I received when I took over a classroom. However, I have always had the students create their own sets and we used them for several games. I gave each students a set of index cards (3 1/2 X 5) and they wrote the fractions in pencil so they couldn't be seen through the cards. These are the fractions we included: all fractions with a denominator of 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, and 12. (To challenge the students you may want to use the 7, 9, and 11 denominators as well.) I also had the students include 2 0's such as 0/3 and 0/4 and two 1's such as 3/3 and 4/4. Each game required two sets of cards, so I had the students write their initials in the corner of their set so they would get a complete set back after the game.
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Fraction War Fraction War with the fraction cards: It is just like the card game of War, but with the fraction cards instead. This game helps students to compare fractions and encourages them to use number sense in comparison before using the algorithm of making equivalent fractions. Memory Memory with the fraction cards: It is just like the traditional "Memory" game, but any equivalent fractions are considered a match so 1/2 would be a match with 2/4. This game helps them to identify equivalent fractions. You can also play this game with fraction to decimal equivalence by making a set of decimal cards too. Fraction/Decimal Bingo Fraction/Decimal Bingo: The students have game boards with decimals on them. You call out fractions and if they have the decimal equivalence they can mark it on the board. Kimberly, 5/31 and 6/1 on teachers.net math board
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Twitter vs. Zombies - 33 views
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Inspired by the popular campus game Humans vs. Zombies, join @Jessifer and @allistelling for an epic zombiefied experiment in Twitter literacy, gamification, collaboration, and emergent learning. Part flash-mob. Part Hunger-Games. Part Twitter-pocalypse. Part digital feeding frenzy. Part micro-MOOC. Part giant game of Twitter tag. Band together your most trusted Twitter allies to defend against a virtual Zombie horde. Collect canned goods, store water, watch your hashtags, and sleep with one eye open. THE RULES TO JOIN THE GAME: Register on this page. Commit to posting at least 10 tweets per day. THEN, TO PLAY: 1. A ZOMBIE can #bite (to attack) once every 30 minutes. A bite will turn a HUMAN to a ZOMBIE in exactly five minutes. A #bite can only be sent to a player who has been active on Twitter in the last five mins. 2. A HUMAN can #dodge (protect yourself) once per hour and #swipe (protect someone else) once per hour. 3. When you are bitten, you have five mins to reply to the ZOMBIE with #dodge or have another player reply to you and the zombie with #swipe. A turned HUMAN must update the Twitter vs. Zombies Scoreboard by changing his/her status to ZOMBIE. 4. The rules are emergent. There will be challenges, amendments, and rule adaptations as suggested by the community and implemented by administrators. Keep your eyes on the blog and #TvsZ for updates. Anatomy of an action tweet: [@name(s)] [body of tweet with action tag #bite, #dodge, or #swipe playfully inserted] [game tag: #TvsZ] Example of a bite/dodge: @DigiWriMo attacks: "@moocmooc I want to #bite your lovely flesh. #TvsZ @moocmooc dodges: "@DigiWriMo No you don't. I have not used #dodge in an hour. #TvsZ Example of a bite/swipe: @DigiWriMo attacks: "@moocmooc What's that lump on your neck? Is that some kind of #bite? #TvsZ @Jessifer defends: "@DigiWriMo @moocmooc I #swipe your hungry beak. [pets @moocmooc] #TvsZ The game is beta, and we will be crowd-sourcing the rules as it's played.
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shared by Holly Barlaam on 15 Jan 11
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Scienterrific Games - 128 views
scienterrificgames.3dcartstores.com
games teacher resources science education review games review biology chemistry physics
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I love Scienterrific Games. At this site, you'll find a variety of games (board games, card games, etc) to use as review with your students. They are geared more toward high school, but all the typical high school sciences are represented. The owner is a former colleague who is a total inspiration to me. The games are not free, but are VERY reasonably priced. I have used several, and my students LOVE them.
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Pathfinders Game - Strategizing for College - IES Grant - 80 views
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A combination of tools such as graphic novels, board games, and online games will be developed for middle school students.
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The online version of the high school Pathfinder card game will have players guide a character through class and activity selection, time management challenges, putting together application materials, and acquiring the financial resources to afford college and its related costs. Games are to take about a week to complete and will require 5–10 minutes at a time to advance the game. The goal of the game is not only to be accepted but also to be able to afford and be prepared to succeed at the player's college of choice. Students can repeat play the game using characters with different backgrounds.
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Bill Tierney at USC got over a million bucks to modify his card game called Pathfinders to an online version so it can be played on Facebook. "The intended audience is students with low-income backgrounds who are not aware of their postsecondary options and who attend schools lacking strong college guidance counseling." Hope the players can cash in their winnings at a local casino and get real money to pay for college! That would be even better!
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Maths Games - from Mangahigh.com - 132 views
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A fantastic maths games website which has games designed to practise particular skills in maths. There's blasting robots for the boys and picking flowers for the girls. You can play most games by simply scrolling down on the homepage and pressing the game you want and signing up is not necessary to play these games. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/Maths
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Maths Games - from Mangahigh - 60 views
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A fantastic maths games website which has games designed to practise particular skills in maths. There's blasting robots games and picking flowers games. Signing up is not necessary to play most games. A must try site. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/Maths
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shared by Josephine Dorado on 06 Mar 13
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"9 Minutes" Mobile Game Evaluation Demonstrates Positive Change for Pregnant Women | Ga... - 19 views
www.gamesforchange.org/...tive-change-for-pregnant-women
games gaming seriousgames education health child development G4C report evaluation
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Positive results of a recent evaluation of the mobile phone game, 9 Minutes, that was produced as part of the "Half the Sky Movement". The game was developed for feature phones commonly used in India and East Africa. 9 Minutes plays out the adventure of pregnancy and rewards pregnant women and their spouses for keeping both mother-to-be and the baby inside her healthy and happy.
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Mobile learning with location-aware, augmented-reality business games - Ako Aotearoa - 24 views
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This project included the development of a business game which was tested by students and teachers on two campuses. It contributed to improving the practicality and accessibility of mobile learning tools which can be used to improve engagement and achievement of undergraduate students in business and related disciplines. A working mobile-learning business game using location-aware augmented reality was developed to support teaching business-related concepts and skills. The open-source application is freely available at http://sourceforge.net/projects/mlearngame/. It provides a business game toolset that can be used by any tertiary provider without major investment in time or technology.
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Jesse Schell's mindblowing talk on the future of games (DICE 2010) « fox @ fury - 54 views
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Here is an interesting (and very entertaining) presentation at game designer conference, talking about the way game design is invading the real world. It's a fascinating look at future possibilities, including the intentional influence on school and society- making people behave better through game design. Be warned, he uses some words that are inappropriate for school.
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ClassTools.net: Create interactive flash tools / games for education - 7 views
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Critical-Gaming Network - Game Design 101 - 62 views
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shared by Steve Kelly on 28 Dec 13
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A Game With Heart, Gone Home Is A Bold Step In Storytelling : All Tech Considered : NPR - 53 views
www.npr.org/...is-a-bold-step-in-storytelling
game storytelling npr tech considered grrrl punk videogames gaming
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Let me just get this out of the way: Gone Home is one of the most deeply intimate and emotionally honest gaming experiences I've had in my more than 25 years of playing video games.
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Though more of a story exploration game or a piece of interactive short fiction, Gone Home (available for Windows, Mac and Linux) weaves its touching story with such deft and narrative grace that it is hard not to be sucked in immediately.
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Billed as a "story exploration game," Gone Home has users exploring an empty house and piecing together why no one is home.
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(32) (PDF) An Overview and Study on the Use of Games, Simulations, and Gamification in ... - 14 views
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"This article examines the use of both game-based learning (GBL) and gamification in tertiary education. This study focuses specifically on the use of games and/or simulations as well as familiarity with gamification strategies by communication faculty. Research questions concentrate on the rate, frequency, and usage of digital and non-digital games and/or simulations in communication courses, as well as instructor familiarity with gamification. A survey was constructed with questions emerging from the game-based learning and gamification literature. It was distributed to communication faculty at public institutions of higher education in a southern state. In this context, the author argues that while the term gamification is novel, the approach is not. Based on the results, current gamification strategies appear to be a repackaging of traditional instructional strategies."