Video Games: A New Perspective on Learning Content and Skills

• July 22, 2010 by Sherrelle Walker, M.A.

Being in the business of e-learning, I am fascinated by video games. No, I’m not a big player myself, but they amaze me for what they can do in terms of teaching and learning. While their primary goal may be to entertain, the core of what they do is perform a continuous process of teaching, simulated practice and assessment, all while engaging learners in learning from worlds rich with content and experience.

As teachers, we’ve always looked to various types of non-interactive content to engage and instruct students. Prior to the 20th century, we depended upon print. In the 1970’s, I remember cassette tapes and film strips coming into the classroom. In the 1980’s, it was video cassettes. Now, we show DVD’s and online video.

Today our digital native students are looking for the kind of interactivity that they experience in their lives outside of school—and that includes the video games that they play. But what skills and experiences can students gain through interactive gaming environments?

• Learning to try. According to James Gee of Arizona State University, the essence of gaming is that, by its nature, it integrates learning with embedded assessment. With textbooks and lectures, a learner gains knowledge by reading and hearing about subjects. In simulated environments, learners experience situations and content first-hand. They attempt solutions, experience failures and learn from mistakes to proceed to higher levels. They are rewarded for pushing the envelope.
• Thinking about the big picture. In A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink discusses six different senses essential for success in our age, one of which is "symphonic thinking," or the ability to see the big picture of situations, manipulate multiple variables and add invention to solve problems. In today’s rich and detailed game environments, players must successfully learn to do exactly that to achieve the goals of the simulation.
• Collaborating and cooperating. With the introduction of online video games, successful achievement of objectives requires communication and collaboration amongst multiple players. In today’s world, these are clearly skills that one needs to achieve success.

While the so-called edutainment market is small, educators and entrepreneurs alike are in the process of bringing the true educational value of computer games into the classroom.

Is the shift going to be rocky? Absolutely. As an example, look at the debate around a "historical action" game called Six Days in Fallujah and the mainstream discussion that has taken place on NPR and in Newsweek. Will this genre of game become a new form of documentary? If contextualized appropriately by a teacher, can this breed of games represent a serious way for students to experience the civics, political science or world history first-hand? After considering that, check out Games for Change, an example of a new breed of online games for teaching and learning a wide variety of topics with significant human impact. This is a challenging and productive debate, one that will take the marriage between computer games and the instruction of content and skills to the next level.

Edutopia recommends many resources for further exploration of the value of computer games in education, including:

• Let the Games Begin offers a wonderful perspective on the educational value of games.
• Schools Use Gaming for Learning and Assessment (video) presents an overview of the benefits of computer gaming simulations.
• In Big Thinkers, Professor James Gee (mentioned above) discusses the opportunities and advantages that gaming provides for learning and assessment.

What role do you think video games should play in education?  Share your perspective on our Scientific Learning Facebook page!

Categories: Education Trends, Family Focus, Reading & Learning

Tags: assessments, decision making, digital natives, innovation, learning environment, learning through play, motivating students, novelty, play, social studies, technology in education

What is Number Sense and How Does it Relate to Math Skills?

• April 20, 2010 by Bill Jenkins, Ph.D.

Let’s talk about the Approximate Number System, or just "the ANS." The ANS is the instinctive ability to nonverbally represent numbers. We constantly use this capability in every day decision making, such as choosing the shorter checkout line at the store or wanting to try a meal at a crowded restaurant. In these situations, our gut decisions are mathematically based. Evidence shows that many different species not only share this capacity, but use it to guide everyday behaviors such as foraging and judging time and distance.

So how does the ANS work in non-humans? Let’s do a little study of my two labs, Bella and Buddy. Both love to chase tennis balls, love to swim, and are highly competitive in the ball-chasing department. Buddy clearly exercises his ANS judgment routinely when I throw the ball into the water. If he and Bella approach the water’s edge at about the same time, they both jump in. On the other hand, if Bella beats him to the water by a significant distance, he recognizes instinctively that he can’t beat her to the ball in the water, so he’ll stop and wait until she brings it nearly to the shore. At that point, he jumps in and goes for the steal.

Why is the ANS important for math skills? It is believed that human mathematical competence comes from two representational systems. One is the "symbolic representations" that must be explicitly taught and are the basis for calculus and geometry. The other–the same one that Buddy uses above–is the older approximate number system. The evidence suggests that very young babies can use this ANS to make approximate number judgments, differentiating one item from two, two items from three and three items from greater than three. Further, a growing body of evidence indicates that individual differences in math achievement are related to variations in the acuity of an evolutionarily ancient, unlearned approximate number sense. Interestingly, evidence also suggests that this ANS may be subject to influence by early learning.

If you’d like to dig deeper into understanding the science of the ANS, I recommend reading Halberda and Feigernson’s 2008 study, "Developmental Change in the Acuity of the ’Number Sense’: The Approximate Number System in 3-, 4-, 5-, and 6-Year-Olds and Adults." For an overview, The New York Times published a write up on the article and even included a link to an interactive, online activity that demonstrates the ANS in action.

Categories: Brain Research, Reading & Learning

Tags: cognitive skills, decision making, early learning, Innate abilities, intelligence, math