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

Study: Active Videogames Make Kids Break a Sweat

The Wii makes things easy to measure for researchers, as noted here many moons ago. The Wii Fit has spawned research linking active video games with increased health benefits. This seems to be a developing trend, as more research along these lines has been presented recently.

Charlene Laino over at WebMD reports that Gregory Brown, over at University of Nebraska, presented a study at the 55th Annual Meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine.

Brown and colleagues studied 25 youngsters whose average age was 11. The kids burned two to three times as many calories when playing Wii Boxing and Wii Tennis than when engaging in traditional handheld video games.

Their average heart rate shot up from 80 to 120 beats per minute — “about what you’d expect when walking or doing a slow dance,” Brown says.

Brown thought the kids would burn even more calories when playing Dance Dance Revolution, where participants stand in front of the television and boogie in step to instructions and graphics on the screen. But that didn’t prove to be the case; all three games proved equally beneficial.

Also presented at the conference was a study comparing Dance Mat Mania and Eye Toy Boxing, games which require physical activity, with a handheld game and watching a DVD. The less physical activities produced caloric consumption on par with reading; the active games produced heart rates equivalent to jogging. This second study was presented by Viki Penpraze, a doc candidate over at U. Glasgow in Scotland.

Meanwhile, Erica Hendry at USA Today reports all public schools in West Virginia will use Dance Dance Revolution next year, and North Carolina schools will introduce, “the HOPSports Training System into schools through a partnership with Be Active North Carolina, a non-profit group.” It offers simulated basketball dribbling and other sports related skills.

References:
Hendry, E. R. (2008, July 31). Exercise video games get kids off the couch. USA Today. [Online]. Retrieved August 1, 2008 from http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/weightloss/
2008-07-30-exercise-games_N.htm

Laino, C. (2008, May 30). Kids feel the burn with virtual exercise. [Online]. Available: http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/news/20080530/
kids-feel-the-burn-with-virtual-exercise