Its late… 1am…and I’ve still not succeeded in the task Id
set myself to have completed by midnight. I know this situation isn’t unusual
for us teachers…however this time was unique for me because the task was to
complete a mission as a titan guardian/warrior on my sons PS4 Destiny game. Destiny is
a first-person shooter video game set in a "mythic science fiction" world, the game features a massively-multiplayer "shared-world" environment with
elements of role-playing games.
Ive intentionally devoted time towards exploring gaming with
the purpose of learning how these games educate gamers (like both my 12 &
14 yr old sons) to develop key skill sets and strategies to succeed in their
games…(No really..Honestly, this is not just what I’m telling my wife.)
I have recently begun focusing on gaming for education
because of the interest our learners at Te Karaka Area School have with games.
During a course I was shown a short clip about gaming and its
role in education by James Gee. It’s
a thought provoking insight into the culture of gaming and the divide between
traditional education and gaming based education developed by businesses like
Bungie (the creators of Halo and Destiny). I initially focused on his
comparison between assessments of learning between conventional systems and
gaming. Its well worth watching and only 5 minutes long.
As I begun to write this blog, my 14 year old son sat down
with me and asked what I was working on. I replied Im writing a blog about what
Im learning about through playing Destiny. I explained how Im thinking about
how valuable games like Destiny can be for teachers. I immediately saw a
flicker of interest in my sons eyes…”What will you be saying?” “Well I’ve seen
how much time and effort you devote towards developing the skills and
strategies you need to succeed in your game… and that’s an amazing blog in
itself, but this blog is focusing on the obvious value you and your brother
place on even the small and (in my mind less important) details like appearance
and affiliations. You spend hard earned credits on making your guardian look
colourful or upgrading armour based on style or clan instead of function or
purpose. My son laughed at this..” Yeah its real fun..and they (the creators)
are about to put a person on Tower whose whole purpose is to teach your
guardian new dance moves….” Yep your Destiny guardian can save the universe and
bust out the meanest dance moves at the same time… go figure. I said to K.. “
It must be annoying when teachers or adults talk about games as being
irrelevant and of no real value when they are clearly so important to you..” My
sons reply…“Yep..” I could see I got him thinking… “Hey Dad I read on line
recently of a study that showed that people who played Portal 2 did better on
spacial awareness tests that luminosity users.”
We checked it out..There is and its true. (Man am I setting his learning
advisor up for a fun time next term.)
Gee describes games as a combination of learning and problem
solving experiences. I am beginning to think that this is a simplification of
the deeper learning & problem
solving experiences games like Destiny provide. My children have committed a
reasonable amount of effort into their on line characters. This is clearly
their online identity..not just in appearance but also in status, affiliations,
reputation and style (as in dancing..) Why discredit this identity as nonsense
or of no real worth? Who are we even to say such a thing? Perhaps most
importantly how can we use this concept effectively when designing learning
programs within our education systems? In asking these questions I have a short
list of suggestions that have been had shared with me recently that may be a
good starting point.
An online site called Classcraft
appears to be successfully helping teachers to bring status and identity into
the classroom. I haven’t yet tried it out but the more I learn about gaming and
gamification of learning the more I return back to this as an option.
Digital badges are being used more frequently now for
recognition of specified achievements. One site recommended to me is credly.com .
This again may be used as an indicator of progression (another key
gaming concept according to Seth Priebatsch in his Tedtalk on
building a game layer on top of the world.)
This last suggestion is referring to a suggestion that both Gee
and Priebatsch make in their video about "leveling up". At TKAS we use
SOLO Taxonomy for guiding learning within our programs. Levelling up can be
used to incentivise our learners to progress towards extended abstract. I often
explain to our learners that gaining extended abstract is not much more work than
what they have already have completed for achieved. Its not about quantity but
quality. Developing a rubric system that shows that achieved is <75%, merit
76% < 89% and Extended Abstract 90% + may better express this concept while
helping with the level up idea.
Finally I would whole heartedly encourage teachers to take
some time to explore digital gaming from a pedagogical view point. Ive had some
amazing discussions with TKAS learners and clearly see their appreciation when
I take time to listen to their stories and share my own gaming experiences with
them. I know that I am only just beginning to experience the amazing learning
oriented concepts being applied in modern online gaming. I know this is well
worth staying up for.
