No Need to Reinvent the Wheel to Revolutionize Educational Video Games

(Fellow blogger Tom DeRosa and I are trading posts this week. He runs the excellent blog, I Want to Teach Forever. Be sure and take a look at his book, too.  Details after the article – JR)

I am not a gamer. I don’t own any consoles, and the only game I play with any regularity is Tetris online. When I look at video games today, I usually see them through the eyes of an educator. This is why I’m so convinced that everything we need to make paradigm-shifting educational video games that kids will actually play has already been created. Instead of starting from scratch, educators need to team up with innovative video game studios and merely tweak the powerful learning-based game models that already exist.

My revelation came over winter break as I was visiting my family in New Jersey. What was to be a very busy holiday turned into a week of me sitting on my Dad’s couch, sick as a dog. My father has an xBox 360 and regularly plays games that involve running around and shooting things (first person shooters or FPS in gamer parlance), none of which I’ve had interest in. This year he was focused on a game that was very different, where he was given a wide open world with innumerable choices and methods of achieving goals and completing tasks: Fallout 3, widely regarded as one of the best xBox titles ever (if not best video game ever).

It is a mix of first person shooter, role playing game (RPG), puzzle (in the vein of Myst or Riven) and open-world exploration (like a single player Second Life) on a scale that by all accounts is hard to find elsewhere. In this game, you make decisions that change your character, and who you are changes the possibilities of what you can do.  You solve difficult problems, most of which have more than one answer. It’s the kind of thinking that we want students to do in school, that we know they need for college and beyond, but it often gets buried beneath rote memorization and test-prep strategies.

Fallout 3 represents a world of well-designed, immersive, and most importantly popular video games that have most or all of the structural elements that make learning possible. These elements are now fairly common in top games:

• Players make decisions that effect not only themselves, but the world around them.
• Players are faced with multi-step problems that require logic and reasoning skills.
• Collaboration and cooperation is encouraged (if not required).
• An engrossing story creates a context that’s fun and far different than their school-influenced concept of “learning”.
• Players are given small, specific tasks to complete, keeping meaningful goals in clear sight.
• Each small task completed is often part of a bigger picture, and each one opens up the possibility for other tasks that keep the player going.
• Most tasks or problems have multiple solutions.
• A comprehensive, fairly automatic system tracks players’ achievements, and can be referred back to at any time.
• There’s some level of freedom to explore and to choose which tasks they will do first (or at all).
• Often, tasks require or would be made easier with background knowledge of a subject players might not already know about. They are often forced to look up and learn about these topics if they truly want to reach their goals.
• Players are encouraged to go back and replay part or all of the game differently in order to reach measurable goals.

If you replaced the word “players” with “students” above, wouldn’t this list appear to be the features of an excellent, high-achieving classroom?

The immersive video game of today encourages, even requires learning and higher order thinking. The structure is there. More importantly, let’s not forget that these games represent the most popular and ubiquitous games available, with a generally bigger audience than movies and TV shows.

The only thing missing is for educators to partner with the studios to incorporate content across the curriculum, taking advantage of what’s already there. Isn’t that what the best teachers always do?

This is a guest post by Tom DeRosa, aka “Mr. D” of I Want to Teach Forever. You can find more ideas, resources and inspiration for teachers on his blog, or in his book Ten Cheap Lessons: Second Edition.

Is FarmVille Educational?

This blog has followed social gaming juggernaut Zynga’s progress for a couple years now. One of its most popular gaming apps is FarmVille, which runs on Facebook and touts an estimated 70 million players, making it one of, if not the, most popular games ever. Testaments to the game’s popularity abound. On the radio station I listen to on the way to work, the morning guys brought up the game recently. One complained he introduced his mother to Facebook, and now she spends hours playing FarmVille. Another said he avoids Facebook specifically so he won’t get caught up playing games like FarmVille all day.

Many players have noted the “work” in FarmVille seems somewhat educational. This, in fact, is what intrigues educators about video games in general. They are so interactive and require focused attention to progress. So, the thinking goes, if we can have students play with educational elements perhaps they’ll absorb some pedagogical content in ways they can’t through books or television.

Could FarmVille be a tool leveraged for classroom use? In November I was invited to sit on a panel of school district tech directors at a regional technology conference to discuss the educational value of social networking. One fellow tech director indicated her school board suggested the district open their network to Twitter, Facebook, and other social tools to students as well as staff. She described the various issues involved, how teachers treated the new access as a classroom management issue, and ways in which the tools were being incorporated into the school day. Then, she said the high school Ag teacher was investigating ways to bring FarmVille into the classroom.

So, is FarmVille educational? Can it be used effectively in the classroom to teach useful things? I turned to the net to see what the hive has to say and also try to find some academic research on the issue.



Math and Organization Skills
Like many games, there are things you can count in FarmVille, and a modest amount of math skills might prove helpful in the game. An eHow article offers six steps in using FarmVille to teach math. Here’s a sample:

Teach fractions using the Chicken Coop and Dairy Barn. There are 4 windows in each building and each building can hold 20 animals. For every 5 animals a head pops out a window. So you can show them how 4/20 is 1/5 of the animals.

CommonSenseMedia.org, which purports to rate video games for parents and teachers, notes that FarmVille requires “simple math and organizational skills.” Later in the review author Carla Thornton writes:

The game itself is clean, safe, and loads of fun, if not especially educational. In FarmVille players plow, plant, and harvest crops to earn virtual coins, raise animals and improve their farmsteads with fences, windmills, and other objects. The more Facebook friends a player can convince to become FarmVille neighbors, the bigger and more successful the farm will be.

Lisa Russell, writing over at the home schooling section for Suite101.com, shows how players can exert a little more math effort to figure out the fastest way to earn money in the game:

Initially, the only seeds available are strawberries, eggplant, wheat and soybeans. Strawberries cost 10 coins and after 4 hours are harvested for 35 coins, a ROI (return on investment) of 25 coins, or 6.25 coins an hour. Using the same method of calculation, it can be seen that the eggplant is worth only 1.31 coins per hour, the wheat breaks down to only 1.1 coins per hour and finally, the soybeans are worth 2 coins per hour. Clearly, the strawberries are a better investment for the player who has time to return in 4 hours to harvest.

Later, she offers a formula for the calculation:

H=harvest value

C=initial price

T=time (in hours)

ROI=(H-C)/T

Players can use a similar formula for comparing the value of their trees (both purchased and gifted) as well as their animals. … FarmVille may have absolutely nothing to offer on a scientific level. In fact, if an entire generation of humans were to learn farming skills from this game, humans might starve to death. However, for math skills and virtual applications of algebra, as well as estimation and strategic planning, FarmVille is more than just fun and games.

So the general consensus seems to be, FarmVille requires a little math skill and some attention to organizational details, but it was made more for fun than education, as are so many popular games.



Academic Interest
As far as academic consensus, a lot of the research interest in FarmVille has revolved around the game indirectly. It crops up in lists of popular social games in academic papers, for instance, but specific studies focusing on the game itself are rare if not non-existent.

A great example of FarmVille serving as a framework for a presentation is one loaded onto Slideshare.net by Sidneyeve Matrix over at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. It is titled Pedagogy Inspired by FarmVille, or Seeds of Engagement, From Social Games to the Classroom: Educational Design Inspired by FarmVille.

In it, she highlights three videogame design principals that can be extrapolated for classroom courses. They are derived from a discussion at the recent Social Games Seattle meeting led by Amitt Mahajan, who is part of the core team and lead designer for FarmVille.

First, instructors should design games with broad appeal. FarmVille succeeds because playing farm is something many kids have grown up doing, sometimes using plastic toys provided by companies like PlaySkool. In the classroom or lecture hall, Dr. Matrix suggests this can translate to humanized case studies, current events, and pop cultural references to widen the appeal of the subject matter to apathetic students.

Second, FarmVille uses something Mahajan called “microsociality,” meaning social connections become painless. Players don’t have to go out of their way to keep up with contacts; they’re all easily accessible in the game. This has become “a viable alternative to offline face-to-facetime,” according to Dr. Matrix. So, for classroom incorporation she suggests instructors build or use existing social sites where students can share and divide workloads and resources.

Finally, FarmVille succeeds because it adds “visual pleasure.” There is a certain graphic appeal to the game, common among most successful commercial titles, that enhances player engagement. Instructors should be sure and incorporate visually appealing graphics in lectures and discussions to help focus attention on the subject matter.

Conclusion
All told, FarmVille is a major hit, sure to be popular for years to come. Educators, as well as perhaps classroom students, can certainly learn a thing or two from the game. But, ultimately, it was designed more for fun than for teaching essential knowledge.

Exploring the Renaissance Through Videogames

Shortly after Assassin’s Creed 2 came out, gamers noticed the rich historical detail included in the game’s setting. The protagonist who players guide through the game is sent back in time to Italy, AD 1499, there to prowl around buildings and streets and attack villains. The developers, self-avowed history nerds, hired consultants to ensure the buildings were rich in period detail. Here’s how The Wall Street Journal reported on their efforts:

They hired Renaissance scholars to advise on period garb, architecture, urban planning, weaponry and the like. They took tens of thousands of photographs of interiors and streets. They used Google Earth liberally to piece together the ground-up and sky-down perspectives through which the action flows. …

The game’s creative director, a Montrealer named Patrice Desilets, lived in Italy for some years, where he acquired a feel for the vivid intrigues of the Renaissance. He grew fascinated, he says, with the notion that “finally people can control time, and relive the past, through games.” The producer, Sebastien Puel, was born in the south of France, in the fortified medieval French town of Carcassonne, and grew up surrounded by history. The head writer, a Harvard graduate from Los Angeles and former screenwriter, Corey May, was driven, he says, by the challenge of “telling a story that feels real and is set among real people who existed.” …

Overall, though, Assassin’s Creed II is as close as we’ve managed to get to real time travel. The grown-ups can lap it up as a kind of virtual tourism. For the high schoolers, still the main audience, the video offers a kind of education by stealth. History matters more if your life depends on it, even as Ezio, and even if you’ve got lives to spare.

The amazing thing is developers of a highly anticipated release would even care to get most of the details right. If modifications of the game are allowed, it may find its way into history courses. It may find its way into classes regardless. Other academic efforts, such as Rome Reborn offer students only the opportunity to explore architecture. In AC2 students can fight bad guys while exploring.

Now, another major game focusing at least in part on the Italian Renaissance is due for release. This one is based on Dante’s Inferno. Yes, players will plumb the depths of hell, as envisioned by Dante, in this game from Electronic Arts. As you might imagine, hell is a bit graphic. Also, if you’ll recall, Dante described levels associated with the seven deadly sins. In the game, the level for lust is particularly graphic, replete with phallic symbols and nudity. This and other extreme graphics earn the game an M rating.

Producers are releasing a print edition of the poem illustrated by pictures from the game, hoping to encourage players to read Dante’s original work. Maybe kids who talk their parents into buying the game, despite its M rating, can actually learn something about the original work. But, I suspect parents would prefer the old-fashioned text version of the poem rather than an explicit video game.

References:
Kaylan, M. (2010, January 12). Time travel gets closer to reality. The Wall Street Journal, D7.

Toy Spy Robots: A Practical Way to Teach Programming

Seymour Papert taught us years ago the most effective way to teach computer programming to children was to make it fun, and MIT’s Logo programming language remains popular (and free). Since then, other languages designed to teach programming concepts have been developed, including Scratch, Game Maker, and Alice. (I wrote an article on educational programming languages for TechEdge that is online here.)

From a commercial standpoint, especially with languages like Logo, the urge to combine programming with real world robotics has been highly successful, most notably with the Lego Mindstorms line of products. Now, a new company has developed a toy spy robot that will encourage the creation and posting of programs by its fans.

The Spy Video TRAKR from Wild Planet Entertainment will blend online and offline fun for budding robotics enthusiasts. Offline, the target market of eight-year-old and older boys can guide the remote controlled vehicle into other rooms and use its wireless camera for surveillance. Taking a tip from Webkinz, which ties an online product with toys in the real world, the Spy Video TRAKR will offer strong inducements to play on their site. Here’s a quote from a recent news article:

Wild Planet says the Trakr goes a step further than other Web-tied toys. It sends children online to create application and then brings them back to the toy, instead of just leaving them playing related games online.

The marketing pitch for this seems brilliant. The toy will function as a spy robot right out of the box, but for the kid who wants more, plenty of customization is offered, whether it’s an app downloaded from the site or one he makes on his own. Here’s part of the press release:

Though the Spy Video TRAKR can be used without ever being hooked up to a computer, tech-minded kids will be quick to connect their toy and start the customization process. Beginners can access an online application modulator that will allow them to modify existing apps as they familiarize themselves with writing code. All the tools they need to write their own unique programs will be available online, for free.

The toy will be available in October, in time for Christmas, and should retail for about $120. I wish the best for Wild Planet, and I hope their new product is highly successful. Also, hopefully, it will encourage many new future programmers to pursue careers in the STEM fields.

References:
Zimmerman, A. (February 10, 2010). I spy a market for kids. The Wall Street Journal, D1.

DSM-V Will Avoid Videogame Addiction

There are very few windmills I’ve charged at on this blog over the years, but one notion I have battled is the idea of video game “addiction.” I prefer the Council on Science and Public Health’s term “overuse” for people who spend too much time playing video games, and I simply do not believe it warrants psychological treatment in and of itself. There may be other issues a heavy gamer needs addressing, psychologically, but not solely video game overuse. That’s my position based on years of engagement with others and consumption of what literature there is on the subject.

In the past, I’ve applauded when the AMA called for more research on the issue before formally deciding to declare video game addiction diagnosable. I’ve been delighted with researchers’ efforts to distinguish between the “addictive” elements surrounding online gambling and traditional role playing games. Finally, my position piece on the issue, Video Game Addiction: Fact or Fiction, remains popular and is currently first to show up on Google searches for “video game addiction fiction,” and fourth on “video game addiction fact.”

So now, the time approaches for the DSM to be modified. One major development in the issue of video game addiction has been to roll it into a broader category of Internet addiction. Since most games these days are online, this sort of makes sense. Overuse of all types of screen time, though, might challenge the definition a bit. If a child spends too much time playing a game that is not connected to the Internet, could he be diagnosed as addicted to the Internet? You can see the difficulties.

Fortunately, the committee in charge of revisions sees the difficulties, too. News this week indicates that gambling will be included in DSM-V as a behavioral disorder, but Internet addiction will not. It will be relegated to an appendix in order to encourage more research, and possible future inclusion in DSM-VI. Of course with so many years between revisions, the relationships we’ve developed with Internet technology may substantially change by that time. Social networking hardly existed just a few years ago, after all.

So, this is a good thing. I’m glad this blog played a part, however small, in the discussion on video game addictions and the struggle over defining it. The public can comment on the proposed revisions to the DSM here, through April. DSM-V is scheduled to be published in 2012-2013, after field trials have been conducted on new and revised diagnoses.

References:
Gever, J. (2010, February 10). DSM-V draft promises big changes in some psychiatric diagnoses. [Online.] Available: http://www.medpagetoday.com/Psychiatry/GeneralPsychiatry/18399

Literacy Tools at LoneStar EduBloggerCon

I’m spending a chunk of the week in Austin for TCEA 2010, and today was the day for LoneStar EduBloggerCon. This is the first year for the “unconference” at TCEA. A nifty promotional video is here:

A great session was delivered by Scott Floyd, who is the technology curriculum specialist over at White Oak ISD in east Texas. He is an outspoken advocate on the state level for students and technology, and runs the influential ed tech blog, A Piece of My Mind.

Scott is a former literacy teacher, and technologies that facilitate and encourage student literacy are always fascinating to him. I sat in on a session he delivered on using blogging to encourage reading and writing with students.

The interesting thing about using blogging tools, WordPress in this case, for students in the classroom is the way their use resembles gaming. Students are charged with a task, often collaborating with one another in producing their product, and complete the “quest” together.

But when the product is published, deep concerns arise among teachers and students regarding errors in the text. So, Scott said, what’s a teacher to do? Should she let an error-riddled post go live on the Web, refuse to allow it to go online without student editing, or just edit it herself? Interestingly, the problem seems to resolve itself through the students, and more concern on “getting it right” is displayed by them when they realize everyone in the world can see their work.

Cool stuff. Anything that helps kids read and write more gets a thumbs up in my book. For more neat stuff on technology and student literacy, follow Scott Floyd on Twitter here.

New 3D Learning Book by Karl Kapp

Karl Kapp is a longtime friend of this blog. His first comment was on a post comparing Second Life to World of Warcraft for educational purposes, way back in 2007, and his blog, Kapp Notes, has been on my blogroll ever since. Dr. Kapp is a full professor of instructional technology over at Bloomsburg University, and is a prominent thought leader and author in the field.

One of the things several researchers in educational gaming picked up on early was the facilitation immersive worlds featuring human-like avatars offered for teaching and learning. This idea has come to be generally termed “3D learning,” because the virtual gaming worlds in which it takes place are rendered in three dimensional graphics. It feels like you are in the world instead of simply playing a board game.

It seems to be a powerful learning tool, and has attracted a lot of attention from educational researchers. Perhaps, researchers suspect, there is something to the notion of transference, where players feels like they are experiencing what their avatar in the 3D virtual world is going through and go on to transfer knowledge from that virtual world to real life applications. Perhaps it is conducive to Csíkszentmihályi’s flow theory, where time becomes irrelevant in the pursuit of passionate tasks. Regardless, it’s an intriguing idea that researchers continue to investigate.

Karl Kapp’s latest book, co-authored with Tony O’Driscoll, explores the ramifications of teaching and learning within these immersive virtual environments. Aptly titled, Learning in 3D: Adding a New Dimension to Enterprise Learning and Collaboration, provides a blueprint for corporate and educational professional development personnel when embarking on efforts to include this type of training in their organizations. Recently, Dr. Kapp made a digital preview of the book available to several bloggers, and embarked on a “virtual book tour.” I was honored to be included on the list, and found the book to be impressive.

I think one of the key contributions to the field this book makes is its insistence that 3D learning is a valid and valuable tool for both corporations and universities. For instance, the whole idea of role playing within virtual 3D environments is supported and reinforced in the book. Business personnel have long known the value of role playing within training regimens. I recall a conversation with someone familiar with the training program for the sales force of a Fortune 100 company. An artificial office environment was created, complete with cameras and recording equipment. The trainee would enter the office and attempt to sell the company’s products to another employee posing as a potential client. Trainers would later review the recordings and help the trainee hone techniques. This entire process is greatly facilitated through 3D virtualization, as the book makes clear.

On an entirely selfish note, I was glad to see the acronym “VIE” included, something I introduced to the field in 2007 in an article in the Journal of Technology and Teacher Education. I called it a virtual interactive environment, while Kapp and O’Driscoll use it to mean virtual immersive environment. Regardless, it amounts to the same thing, and I’m glad to see the idea spread. Education and corporations can use a lot more VIEs.

Naming the Plants of Pandora

O to be a professor in California who movie companies might tap for consulting purposes. Such was the delightful situation Dr. Jodie Holt, chair of the botany and plant sciences department over at UC Riverside found herself in when James Cameron’s people came calling for advice on plant life in the world’s most successful movie.

Dr. Holt advised Sigourney Weaver how a botanist would act in such situations as portrayed in the film. Also, she named the digital creations seen in the rich onscreen scenery, using standard taxonomies. She made up reasonable-sounding Latin names for the plant life, which is included in the official Avatar Pandorapedia and video game. A treatise she wrote, “The Avatar Survival Guide,” also was included in the Pandorapedia. It proffered an explanation for plant development based on environmental details provided to her by Cameron.

Alas, she has not spent much time with the video game. Here’s the relevant statement:

This project was very challenging but also a lot of fun. What botanist would not want to “discover” new plants and name them herself?

I understand that some of these Pandorapedia entries are also contained in the games that were released. However, my husband and I have not yet achieved much proficiency at the video game, so we have not been able to explore Pandora and learn about the plants that way. Hopefully, we can get my young nephew to help us.

Read the full interview here.

References:
Kozlowski, L. (2010, January 2). Inventing the plants of ‘Avatar.’ [Online.] Retrieved January 30, 2010 from http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-avatar-q-and-a2-2010jan02,0,5033714.story

Is Apple’s New Tablet a Game Changer?

Lately Apple has dominated any market outside of PCs the company has chosen to enter. It wasn’t always so; I still remember the Newton and the shellacking it took in public opinion. (Even the political cartoon strip “Doonesbury” made fun of it.) But those days are all behind the company, and the iPod and iPhone dominate their segments. The markets for Apple software have become just as important, with 99 cent songs and varied-priced apps.

Next up is the Tablet, a new computer that has Apple fans salivating. Plenty of programmers have been willing to devote time to developing games for the iPhone, so it’s probable that games will continue to roll out for the Tablet, especially considering Apple’s lucrative revenue sharing system.

Apple will be interested in exploiting the educational market, for the respect dominance there lends as much as the lucre. One of my favorite reporters, Yukari Iwatani Kane, co-wrote an article this week in The Wall Street Journal about the Apple Tablet, which touched on the academic aspects of the product:

In the academic arena, Apple could face hurdles wooing universities if the tablet doesn’t meet their needs or isn’t compatible with other computing devices that students are using.

Amazon had been hoping to target the market with its 9.7-inch screen Kindle DX e-book reader, for example, but schools said the device wasn’t sufficiently interactive and lacked basics such as page numbers and color graphics.

Another hurdle facing any new technology at the university level is the need for accessibility features to be built into the product. After pressure from the Dept. of Justice, several universities agreed to stop promoting the use of the Kindle DX for students, or any other e-book reader, until features making it more accessible for the visually impaired have been implemented.

As always, it would be very nice to see good educational programs and games come out for the Apple Tablet, and not merely repackaging of classic texts or some such. Stay tuned.

References:
Gonsalves, A. (2010, January 14). Universities agree not to promote Kindle DX. InformationWeek. [Online.] Available: http://www.informationweek.com/news/security/government/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=222300989

Kane, Y.I., & Smith, E. (2010, January 23). Apple sees new money in old media. The Wall Street Journal, B1.

The Chasm Between Educational and Commercial Games

Elaine Alhadeff and I have been talking via e-mail to Jeremy Pesner, a recent Computer Science grad from Dickinson College who has been working on educational games that focus on the human immune system. Pesner served as co-author on a paper presented at the ACM Southeast Regional Conference last year. He presented with Patrick Clements over at U. South Carolina on “an educational game that simulates the processes of human immune systems by using a ‘Tower defense’-type game.”

Pesner next will be contributing to a new chapter book edited by Patrick Felicia over at the Waterford Institute of Technology in Ireland. The Handbook of Research on Improving Learning and Motivation through Educational Games: Multidisciplinary Approaches is scheduled to be released in 2011. Pesner’s contribution will explore the “chasm” that has formed between commercial and educational games in terms of “enticing and appealing qualities” between the two genres.

This is a particularly juicy topic ripe for social science research, since it’s so fuzzy. What are the elements in commercial games making them so appealing? Conversely, what makes educational games so dull? How would we measure the difference? What can educational game makers learn from commercial game makers? I think I can speak for Elaine when I say both of us very much are looking forward to Dr. Felicia’s book and Pesner’s contribution.

References:
Clements, P., Pesner, J., & Shepherd, J. (2009). The teaching of immunology using educational gaming paradigms. Proceedings of the 47th Annual Southeast Regional Conference. [Online.] Available: http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1566474