Group items tagged

relates to my T545 course this spring

This post talks about the highly engaging "Gamercamp," referring to some concepts we discussed in T545, and goes on to discuss the potential for gaming in education.

This article offers a useful guide for synthesizing some of the ideas from T545 to classrooms.

I can't argue with this article. Good points.

Schell's talk ends with a simple but important question. How can we design games to not only motivate us in life but to help us be better people?

Interesting article about games and values. In the middle, the author suggests that for game designers, it is important to get people who aren't like them to play the game. This would make for a more inclusive game.

This website offers numerous serious games that claim to offer serious training for various businesses.

I wonder if the instant feedback and scoring feature helps these kids go into a state of flow more easily while learning an instrument. The experience provides the beginner with all the requirements for flow: clear goals, right level of challenge, and instant feedback

Interesting idea: engaging parents to help motivate their kids in school. It includes several of sources of "intrinsic motivation": curiosity, challenge, context, and motivation. I would be interested in seeing a more independent assessment on how successful this system is.

Doodling - self-mechanism for processing info and sustaining engagement?

I came across this great question posted in Quora. One of the responders, Anne Halsall listed structured narratives, diverse hand- drawn animation, more difficult puzzles (less hints), and a single-player experience as hallmarks of 90s adventures games. The highlights of these adventure games are a stark contrast to the conditions, at least according to Gee, that make video games useful learning tools (e.g.,open-ended, immediate feedback, opportunities for socialization). This lead me to wonder, are the trends in contemporary game design driving engagement theory, or is the research driving game design?

This article applies what we've learned about self-efficacy, interest, and engagement to literacy: "What makes a child an engaged reader?"

Thanks for sharing this, Stephanie. Part of my job is to select books for a reading & writing academy in Seoul, and after reading this article I realized that affective elements of reading play a significant role in my book selections.

Hi Stephanie - The author is listed as working for Reading is Fundamental, which is an organization I now follow for my work on the T545 class project. Part of their agenda is to "prepare and motivate children to read by delivering free books and literacy resources to those children and families who need them most." They focus on reaching underserved children from birth to age 8. I am hoping my website project addresses some of the issues raised in this article. Thanks.

An an interactive digital textbook powered by a student-created system called FLOW. "The Cachalot app, powered by FLOW, allows students to take notes, highlight text, tweet at content experts and perform Wolfram|Alpha searches without leaving the screen. (David Johnston/Cachalot)." Also interesting for T565ers about academic project turned down by publishing houses.

Various definitions of learning objects.

After dinner, when Tom Beasley is ready to take a break from his day job in the Yale classics department, he busts out the comic books. But it's all in the name of education, with a digital twist. Beasley, a seventh-year graduate student, is writing his dissertation on Thucydides, chronicler of the Peloponnesian War. In his evening project, he turns from history to the mythology of the Trojan War - in particular, the comic book series Age of Bronze, written and illustrated by Eric Shanower. Beasley's task: produce a reader's guide to the richly detailed, 31-part (so far) comic series in preparation for its release as an iPad app, intended for classroom use. The digital version, called Age of Bronze "Seen," launches on October 15 and includes maps, genealogy charts, and other interactive features.

Bjork, the Hall of Science and middle school students from Queens have been participating in a month-long series of science/music explorations that are "part spectacle, part ipad app emporium, part new instrument laboratory and part curriculum." From The New Yorker Digital Edition : Feb 27, 2012