slides as GBL

My toddler loves slides.  Slides operate on gravity.  Ergo...my toddler now understands gravity?

Clearly there's a step missing.

I think this may be a problem with some forms of game-based learning: we tend to assume that the player (or student) is learning what we intend them to learn form the game.  We make the same mistake with reading: we assign a text such as a work of fiction, or a newspaper article and we assume that the student can understand more than just the words on the page, that he or she can grasp the idea or the message being conveyed.  But that might be too much of an assumption.  It takes skill and training to read texts properly, to understand concepts like metaphor and foreshadowing, or the differences between fact, bias and opinion.  Why should we assume any differently with games?

Ian Bogost uses the term "procedural literacy" to describe the ability to understand how games represent systems. This, I believe, must be taught.  Once the learner understands how games represent systems, then they can use and even design games to learn.  Just as we learn to read so that we can read to learn, we need to learn games so that we can use games to learn.

I would like my toddler to one day think about why you go down on slides (and why climbing up them is so hard) and then to extrapolate that idea to swings, and then to planets in motion.  Then, maybe, she'll be ready to design her own jungle gym.

synonyms for "good student"

Diligent.
Responsable.
Conscientious.
Has grit.
Focussed.
Motivated.

These are all synonyms to describe students who do what the adults want, the way the adults want it, in the time frame the adults assign...and with a goddamn smile on their faces, Soldier!

game mechanics

Early thoughts on a paper...

A POOR UNDERSTANDING OF GAME MECHANICS UNDERMINES GAME-BASED LEARNING WITH STUDENT-DESIGNED GAMES

 

INTRODUCTION

Game-based Learning (GBL) seems to be everywhere these days, and it intuitively seems that this is a good idea.  From a round of Simon Says at preschool to the Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs)  played by increasingly diverse groups of adults; from grand-master Chess and World Cup Football to the ubiquitous cell-phone games of Candy Crush and Angry Birds, it seems that everyone likes games and everyone plays games.  Thus, it seems only natural to incorporate games into the classroom.

There are many ways to introduce game-based learning in the classroom, from the simple Friday-afternoon reward to the highly complex GBL system in place at Quest to Learn schools.

In this paper, however, I propose to focus on using games in a very particular way.  Rather than superposing content on a game base in a “chocolate-covered broccoli” type of way, I will argue that the core mechanics of the game themselves are what drive the message, and that this learning can be enhanced if the students themselves design the game.

I will argue that just as we learn to read so that we can then read to learn, we must be taught to design games in order to then be able to design games to learn.  I suggest that it is not enough for students to play games that others have designed, for the real learning occurs in the process of design itself.

In my study, I show how a group of university undergraduate students understood the concept of game-design when designing games about human-rights and social justice issues.  I will show that their ideas were based on a faulty grasp of the power of game mechanics leading them to learn less than they otherwise could have about the content and that this can be remedied by educating them first in the basic of game-design.

I conclude that the lack of fundamental understanding of how games work undermines the Game-Based Learning approach. 

10 second carpe diem lesson

Take out a piece of paper and something to write with.
Think of someone you love. It could be a relative, a friend, a boyfriend or girlfriend.
Write to this person telling them how you feel.
You have 10 seconds. 
GO. 
3,2,1 STOP.

That's not enough time!

So how much time would be enough?
Carpe diem, kids...SEIZE THE FUCKING DAY!
Now go out and have a great weekend. 

How to plan a lesson

There are many ways to plan a lesson.

You could plan it in the order you're going to teach it.  You could start by planning the warmer and work your way to the end.

Or, you could start with the cheese and work your way back to the entrance of the maze.  Being, in other words, with the final task.  This way you know where you're going.

Or you could go back and forth between the different stages of your lesson.

In EFL, you could start with the grammar and find a topic to match, or start with a topic and add the language you want to teach. 
You could start with a text or a picture. 
You could start from the course book and see how to make it communicative, or start with a communicative task and see how you can make it fit the course book.

No matter how you plan the lesson, always remember:
In the end, you don't teach the lesson...YOU TEACH THE STUDENTS.

Revolution from within

Changing education ideally would mean smashing down the system completely. 
No more kids in rows of desks! 
No more boring textbooks!
Down with parrotting and up with real learning!

The problem is, most teachers work inside that system.  We have to put food on the table and clothes on our kids' backs.  We may want to rebel, but we can't afford to lose our jobs.  Welcome to the real world.

Is compromise between "the system" and our ideals possible?  I say it is. 
I say take the books, take the rows of students and add little drops of meaning.

How do you do that?

Make tasks communicative.  Not all of them, not all at once.  But start.

Take a fill-in-the-blank exercise.  Put the students in pairs and have one read the sentence to the other while the other fills in the gap.

Take two readings and have students do a jigsaw task.

Have students demonstrate comprehension with art such as drawings, collages and cellphone videos.

Have students break down concepts from the book to teach each other.

The Breakfast Club

I've discovered something in common with all the TV shows I like: The Big Bang theory, Two and a Half men, Friends, M*A*S*H, House, Star Trek...they're all character-driven. 

In class, character driven plays, poems, literature, movies, TV shows, even videogames can springboard a lesson into endless possibilities. 
"What if we put these two characters together?"
"How would these characters react if..."
"What if I substitute myself for one of the characters?"

Thus The Breakfast Club reference: take 5 kids who couldn't be more different, force them to interact and see what happens.

exams are like french fries

To continue with the food analogy, here is an exerpt from a trainee journal followed by my response:

I heard some pretty good assessment types from my classmates, but in the end, each one was shot down by you and that was kind of frustrating.  I mean I understand WHY you do that and I would hate it if you didn't, but I got the feeling of "So what the hell are we supposed to use then if everything has a flaw?"  I understand the triangulation concept, but it just seems like it's so so so much work, and with all the other crap that we as teachers have to do, I don't know if there's time to do so much stuff!  What if you think of it like food?  There are SO many nutrients we’re supposed to get every day, but on the other hand we can’t consume too many calories (this was how I gained 20 pounds in my first trimester: I was determined not to have any kind of nutritional deficiency!).  On top of that there are foods you just won’t eat because they’re too pricey or you don’t like them or they’re not available…The point is to do the best you can within the limitations you have.  To continue the analogy, I think easy-to-grade exams are kinda like French fries: they’re good when you just need something fast.  Doing projects, on the other hand would be more like cooking Christmas dinner: time-consuming, impossible to do every day, but well worth the extra effort. 

The dangers of tasting (and testing)

I'm not much of a cook, but I do know that you can't stop to taste the food too often.  For one thing, there'll be nothing left to serve.  Not to mention you'll make yourself fat, or possibly sick (on raw food).

It's the same with testing what your students have learned.  When you stop the class to administer a test, that time is taken away from learning.  Plus, you might be seeing the results of an intermediary stage which won't tell you what the final results will be.  Cookie dough doesn't taste much like cookies.

A good cook uses other ways to check how the food is coming: texture, color.  Imagination.  Guesswork.  Basic knowledge of kitchen chemistry.  

Good teachers also know how to use alternate forms of assessment, from informal hallway conversations with students, to class discussion, to more formally assessed portfolios, artwork and other assignments.  The really good teachers know how to make assessment a part of the learning itself.

Poker as a metaphor for our education system

Poker rules do not specify that you have to bluff...but you can't play poker if you don't bluff.

What about school?  Teachers complain endlessly about cheating, copying, plagiarism and other forms of academic dishonesty, but don't we ask for it by the very nature of the system?

Think about it: you're a student, you've got unreasonable amounts of work for all of your different classes.  Something's gotta give.  In the best case scenario, you plagiarise a little on one assignment so you can devote more time and effort to another.  In the worst case scenario, you simply have so little respect for your teacher for handing you such a dumb-ass assignment in the first place that you plagiarise to show your contempt.  Or, you genuinely don't understand the material and the time given simply isn't enough for you to master it, so you plagiarise just to get the grade you need to pass.

The only question is...will the teacher call your bluff?