Ed Tech Lady
Musings, reflections and comments on educational technology, online learning, faculty development issues, and anything else that comes to mind.
Thursday, November 14, 2013
Friday, August 23, 2013
Friday's Relfections--Minecraft
An off-the-shelf game that is being used in in the classroom is Minecraft. See the video from the Idea Channel people arguing that this game is a "game-changer" in that it offers a new approach to game-based learning since it allows the user to construct the game. As Jeff Dunn (2013) explains, "In other words, a teacher could build his or her own video game tailored to the lessons being taught in the classroom. The students could then enter that custom game and explore, learn, and even build upon it themselves." Check out the video and Dunn's blog post discussing the pros and cons of using Minecraft in the classroom.
Andrew Miller, a blogger for Edutopia noted in this post Ideas for Using Minecraft in the Classroom, that "MinecraftEdu provides a custom mod, basically a customized modification of the game, that helps facilitate organization and focus for teachers to use Minecraft effectively. In addition, Joel Levin, the founder of MinecraftEdu, provides ideas and updates at The Minecraft Teacher blog.
What do you think about Minecraft? Would you use it in your classroom? Just how much work do you think it would take to build a high-quality learning environment within the game?
Thursday, August 22, 2013
Thurday's Thoughts--Serious Games
Serious
Games is an offshoot of the gaming industry. Many of these games have
educational value. Here's a NY
Times article explaining the phenomena. Saving
the World, One Video Game at a Time
One
series that I found compelling is Global Conflicts. According to their
website, “Global Conflicts” is an award-winning educational game series used
for teaching citizenship, geography, and media courses. The series allows
students to explore and learn about different conflicts throughout the world
and the underlying themes of democracy, human rights, globalization, terrorism,
climate and poverty. The game series is easy to use for teachers and is
developed with close attention to curriculum requirements and ease of use in
classroom teaching." You can get access to all the games for a 30-day
trial.
Check out this intro video for the Palestine Conflict. There are others available on YouTube as well. One thing I've found is that gamers like to record themselves as they go through a game. It's interesting, getting a stream-of-consciousness account of what they are thinking as they go.
Check out this intro video for the Palestine Conflict. There are others available on YouTube as well. One thing I've found is that gamers like to record themselves as they go through a game. It's interesting, getting a stream-of-consciousness account of what they are thinking as they go.
Another Resource
Blunt,
R. (2009, December). Do serious games work? Results from three studies. eLearn Magazine. Retrieved from http://elearnmag.acm.org/featured.cfm?aid=1661378Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Wednesday's Wonderings--Gamify the Classroom
The NMC Horizon Report > 2012 K-12 Edition
identified mobile devices & apps and tablet computing as technologies
expected to enter mainstream use in the first horizon of one year or less--that means NOW.
Game-based learning and personal learning environments are seen in the second
horizon of two to three years. In fact, the Report notes that the most popular
games tend to be in app form (combining the two technology tools).
James
Gee is a researcher in the field of educational games. These articles come to
mind:
1) Game-like learning: An example of situated learning and implications for opportunity to learn
2) Good Video Games and Good Learning
1) Game-like learning: An example of situated learning and implications for opportunity to learn
2) Good Video Games and Good Learning
What is it about games
that make them powerful educational tools? Why are so many people engaged in
playing? What would be the advantages and disadvantages of using games as a
learning model?
Additional Resources:
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