Group items tagged

This website has a live thread of conversation from teachers all over the world discussing game based learning. Many teachers give great advice on what to try in classrooms and there are also videos and resources to use as well.

Elearning Industry published their top statistics on the size of the digital learning and game-based learning markets as well as some of the recent trend reports on how kids and adults see these tools.

The author suggests that learning is a process of connecting information sources. What better place to connect information than online, where a world of information is at our fingertips. The author discusses Web 2.0 (blogs, wikis, social networking, and virtual gaming environments to name a few) and how they've impacted learning and helped to shape the idea of connectivism.

Gaming | August 2013 Digital Edition Today's sophisticated digital games are engaging students and conveying hard-to-teach concepts like failure and perspective. So why aren't more classrooms playing along? If the use of technology in education is about meeting students where they are, it seems like gaming would be a good place to start.

I have long been a proponent of gaming in education, if for no other reason than the fact that I like video games, whether they are educational or not. I had the good fortune to have an opportunity to work for a short while with some individuals from MIT Education Arcade (although we couldn't get a product concept together), and this reinforced my belief that gaming has the possibiity of extending learning farther outside the classroom than has been seen in a long time.

Wayzata Plymouth Creek Elementary School Media Center provides an extensive list of digital games that can be used in the library to help students learn and improve their library skills such as ABC order, fiction and nonfiction, the parts of a book, genres, and finding books online and on the shelf.

A thorough article about various aspects of games and information literacy in the digital age. Includes a list of references and an embedded TEDx talk from noted teacher-librarian and researcher Joyce Valenza.

Order in the court. Hail to the chief! Roll call…yea or nay… iCivics is game, activity and resource filled Web site, founded by Justice, Sandra Day O'Conner to help young people of all ages learn about branches of government, citizenship, separation of powers, media influences on government, the budget, and the Constitution and Bill of Rights. Games can be accessed by topic or playing time. In addition to games and webquests, iCivics provides lesson plans with supporting resources for teachers. Grades 3-12. Tip: Combine curricular learning with service learning by challenging students to participate in the iCivics Impact Project.

ABCya.com is the leader in free educational kids computer games and activities for elementary students to learn on the web. All children's educational computer activities were created or approved by certified school teachers. All educational games are free and are modeled from primary grade lessons and enhanced to provide an interactive way for children to learn.

customize and embed learning review games

Here, Ravenscroft conducts a theoretical look at connectivism. He asks what the role of networked technolgies is in the digital age and suggests that tool selection, desired dialogue, and genre should all be considerations for networked learning. He says that "embracing connectivism means that we need to consider new design metaphors for future learning that place the person, their social behaviour, and their community at the centre of the design process and the resulting network technologies" (155).

I found this to be a particularly interesting article. The authors propose the development of a new theoretical model that integrates the foundations of social constructivist thinking, with an emphasis on dialogue, with the connectivist approach to networking. This combination in turn is meant to illicit, support, and increase in collaborative inquiry. The dialogue game provides the students just enough structure necessary to facilitate a organic discussion and critical inquiry.

This website is a great tool for any teacher who is specifically looking to spice up their math classroom. It has 100 sites and/or apps to use that are centered on game based learning. These sites all incorporate learning math concepts and is a great engagement tool in any classroom.

In this site, communities of practice are defined as "groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly." This seems very encompassing. It would include a group of friends that play a simple, addicting game on their smartphone. If this group of friends hangs out and discusses tips on how to do well in the game, boom: community of practice. At this point in my research, I'm surprised that there is so much literature produced to discuss something so simple. The value of a community of practice is clear: passionate, committed people doing something and learning from each other. But this has existed throughout human history, and is now labeled. Next, I'm going to search for who coined this term.

This speaker does an excellent job showcasing that our students are totally capable of being part of a learning network before they can even recognize what it is they're doing. Things have changed intensely since the rise of networked connections between people. School needs to adapt and use these tools that professional educators are using to improve meeting the many "standards" that Mr. Regur talks about. "We have standards just to write standards…" We need to avoid the closed off island that is being a teacher… There is no longer an excuse to be stuck in this single-player version of education.

We all create personal learning networks in everything we do. Using this in education is extremely important so that students a) know how to connect with others, and b) know how to benefit from connecting with others. I like how he called the "teacher the most important activator".

Two is a meeting, Three is a network. Steve had some great "real" advice and reasons for why we should all join PLN for a variety of different reasons to create a stronger and more educated world.

This article comes from PSU's Education magazine. It's about bringing gaming into the K-12 classroom.

A teacher brought in two experts via Google Hangout to meet with some students working in a computer gaming program. The students were able to takeaway tips from the experts for their programming and connect with "real" designers.

Great problem-solving, simulation, game for business students. The object is to become the Carnival Manager: A local fun-filled carnival / theme-park urgently requires a virtual managing director to oversee ride and attraction construction, the hiring of staff, general park management, strategic planning, and financial budgeting.

A blog focused on games used in language teaching.

a resource of links to game formats for learning English

An amusement park of math and more... Lessons and games designed for fun! Bored with math? Confused by math? Hate math? Yeah, Coolmath can fix that. Totally dig math? Want to learn more math? Want to get ahead in math? Want to play some cool math games?