Here's some more stuff on technology and STEM, but as it pertains to professional development. The question is how does this program motivate teachers other than the extrinsic reward of professional development points???
As we students become graduates, Christensen's article is interesting both for perspective on career advice as well as it's broad references to extrinsic and intrinsic motivation in the workplace. As an HBS professor, he takes a very Business School approach to motivation.
Off the heels of our class discussion on extrinsic motivation in paying students - The producers of this educational media have built in an "allowance pledge" for parents to pay their kids to play DimensionU's games.
An interesting post on games in education that links to many examples for learning to code and mentions some other online educational environments that use gamification.
Hi Stephanie -
This article also seems to highlight the extrinsic rewards of points and badges -- calling it "gamification." And given our last conversation in class, I wonder if all the points and badges will kill the intrinsic desire to play the games. Interestingly, there was a comment with a link to another article http://www.hideandseek.net/2010/10/06/cant-play-wont-play/ where the writer notes that some games just use "pointification," and that the best games are the ones that have rich cognitive, emotional and social aspects, with choice and skill... but not dependent on points/badges. In light of our "motivation" conversations, it will be interesting to watch how gaming in the classroom plays out if they are largely point/badges driven.
Cathy Davidson reflects on the recent Harvard Innovations in Learning and Teaching (HILT) symposium (wish I had been there) and shines light on the value of badges [peer rewards/extrinsic] vs. multiple-choice tests [often a disincentive to learning].
A quick overview of digital badges (including pros/cons re intrinsic/extrinsic motivation) and introduction of "Badge Economy" ["With support from the MacArthur Foundation, Mozilla has developed an Open Badge Infrastructure, or OBI, designed to become the underlying technical scaffolding for badges," where user can collect badges earned in a digital backpack.]
This game seems to be very similar to a popular farm game in China. The different types of motivation (such as coin rewards) remind me of the extrinsic and intrinsic motivations mentioned in today's class.