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Our very own Jess McCulloch on wired.com ... "One of the most enjoyable games I've been a part of in recent times has been an Alternate Reality Game (ARG) being run by an innovative teacher from Australia. We usually think of ARGs as large scale, requiring lots of resources and being part of a marketing campaign for a new movie - or as some funky, alternative techy game that the cool kids play. But it doesn't have to be."

Gaming is growing each day, with students and educators embracing its potential. Here are 8 examples of gaming's classroom success.

Gaming is growing each day, with students and educators embracing its potential. Here are 8 examples of gaming's classroom success.

Doctor Who is teaming up with a Dalek and trying to save the universe and teaching children some early computer programming skills at the same time in a game due to launched on the broadcaster's CBBC website. The Doctor and the Dalek includes voice narration from current Doctor Peter Capaldi, and a new story by Phil Ford, who has written for the TV show.It is a free web game is aimed at 6-12 year-olds, and involves freeing a battered Dalek from a ship of Cybermen, then building it back up to full strength through puzzles based on the programming elements of the new English computing curriculum. At the moment the game is only playable on computers, but the development team is working on future updates that will will try to make it work on tablets too by early 2015.

Classtools is a tool for educators to make their own educational games, which can be shared via email or embedded in a web page. There are 15 easy-to-use templates, which make game creation easy. There's also a selection of premade games, which teachers may use with their students

Another PEW report, this time into gamification "Tech stakeholders and analysts generally believe the use of game mechanics, feedback loops, and rewards will become more embedded in daily life by 2020, but they are split about how widely the trend will extend. Some say the move to implement more game elements in networked communications will be mostly positive, aiding education, health, business, and training. Some warn it can take the form of invisible, insidious behavioral manipulation. "The development of 'Serious Games' applied productively to a wide scope of human activities will accelerate simply because playing is more fun than working," observed Mike Liebhold, senior researcher and distinguished fellow at The Institute for the Future."

Gabe Zichermann is an entrepreneur, author, highly rated public speaker and gamification thought leader. He is the chair of the Gamification Summit and Workshops, and is co-author of the book "Game-Based Marketing, where he makes a compelling case for the use of games and game mechanics in everyday life, the web and business. Gabe is also a board member of StartOut.org and facilitator for the NYC chapter of the Founder Institute. For more information visit: http://www.tedxkids.be

An interactive online course to teach students how to make their own games. This 12-Module course includes everything you need to make your own game, including the software, graphics, and sound effect libraries.

EdGames contains downloadable games, game templates and utilities that can be used to enhance any lessons. Powerpoint, Excel and Word templates provided.

"Data Dealer is an online game about collecting and selling personal data - full of irony and gleeful sarcasm. It´s a browser/serious/edu/impact game about digital culture and surveillance and aims to raise awareness about online privacy in a new and fun way. The English version was released in May 2013. Let's call it a bastard offspring of certain shiny 2010 Facebook Games and the 1990 TV simulation game Mad TV, reborn with the souls of South Park and Bruce Schneier. And it´s also available on Facebook! Oh, the irony. In today´s digital age virtually everything we do is recorded, monitored or tracked in some way: Data Dealer is a unique interactive exploration of this personal data ecosystem."

Very useful wiki for people looking at introducing gaming into their classroom or school. Loads of examples of games that could be integrated into the curriculum. I am about to loose some time checking some of these out.

"Using games in the classroom - This is a presentation to pre-service teachers about the affordability and importance of game-play. Low-end."

"In order to make it on this list, games had to: * be accessible to English Language Learners. * provide exceptionally engaging content, * not provide access to other non-educational games on their site, though there is one on this list that doesn't quite meet this particular criteria. * be seen by me during the second part of 2015. So they might have been around prior to this time, but I'm still counting them in this year's list."

Game-based learning offers an approach where learning and play aren't at odds with each other; in fact, games are the vehicle and environment for learning.

An infographic from Online Colleges on video games in education

The key to learning to code is learning to think like a computer--which is a hard thing to do. "It requires structured thinking, ability to abstract details away, and there's little margin for error--one little typo and your program might do something entirely different from what you wanted," says game developer Rui Viana. "The real world just doesn't work like that, so it's hard to get your head around it." Which is precisely why Viana created Cargo-Bot, a simple iPad app that turns "thinking like a computer" into a genuinely addictive puzzle game. It's like Angry Birds crossed with Codecademy, and it's total genius.

"A venture that started in a Bondi flat is helping Microsoft unlock the power of its Kinect gaming gadget so that it could control home automation, read sign language, monitor hospital patients and even enable users to edit movies or play music using just body movements."

"Minecraft - 'a game about breaking and placing blocks' - is one of the world's biggest-selling computer games. When Jane Costello wanted to find out why her son Otis, eight, was so smitten, she quickly found out about its infinite possibilities"

"KFC Australia has created its first ever branded mobile gaming app to directly target the young adult market. KFC teamed up with DT - part of Ogilvy Australia and STW - in October last year and released the KFC Snack! In the Face mobile gaming app for android and apple devices. The campaign ran from October 8 to December 2, 2013 where 2,500 free prizes were given away every day of the campaign plus multiple achievement prizes were available. All rewards were mobile-based and redeemable in all 600 KFC stores across Australia."

"With its open-ended nature and robust creation tools, Minecraft has been used to create some amazing things. And as one teacher learned, those very same elements that make the game so compelling also make it a great educational tool.

A fun game to try out, don't let the graphics distract or confuse you. This is easy to use, bigger and much more complicated than it first looks. Good learning potential.

"How Microtask's Digitalkoot game helps weed mistakes out of the Finnish National Library's e-archives One more step, and a tiny creature will cross the bridge and get to safety. Just one more step - but letters do not match, the fragile structure blows up and the brown mole falls into a digital abyss. But as Juha Valtamo, a 21-year-old Finnish student, correctly types the next word that appears on the screen of his laptop, another mole happily reaches the destination. Digitalkoot may sound like a typical online game - but there is more to it than just building bridges and saving moles."