Video Games in the Classroom?

In the past two weeks there have been a number of articles that tout the benefits of using video/computer games in the classroom as effective learning tools.

Although most baby-boomers view video games as primarily a leisure activity that's for the most part frivolous, these articles from Phi Delta Kappan and Teaching Exceptional Children point to the positive ways in which video/computer games can help students learn.

The games they reference are ones that have been or are being developed for use in the classroom, not video games like Halo.

Video/computer games can offer the following for all students:

• They personalize learning
• They build conceptual understanding and motivation
• They can provide teachers with diagnostic information on stundets' learning needs
• They cultivate student persistence (in that one needs to demonstrate quantitative mastery before moving to the next level)

One game highlighted was called Refraction which helps students learn about fractions. I played it and liked it; you should try it too.

The Gates Foundation recently initiated GLASS (Games, Learning, and Assessment) to develop classroom games that "can serve as assessment tools, develop complex skills, and help transfer learning to different contexts."

Another article focused on the how teachers can use blogs to improve students' writing.

When I was a student, writing was rarely relevant for me. I wrote essays for a teacher who then read, commented on, graded, and gave them back to me. (I typically looked at the grade and ignored the teacher's written comments, but that's a topic for another blog.) The teacher would occasionally read to the class an example of an exemplary piece of writing, yet for most part writing was a more solitary exercise for my classmates and me. (It never occurred to me until I was in a small liberal arts college--where most assessments required writing--that writing could be fun, personal and a liberating way for me to express my ideas, thoughts, opinions and feelings.)

Blogs can provide relevance (in that students have an audience of more than one teacher), peer commentary and modeling, and a greater sense of egalitarianism (kids have a voice equal to the teacher).

Many of you have heard that classroom activities, assignments, and assessments need to be "authentic" for kids, and with blogging kids see the purpose and relevance of writing; after all, they are writing in real time for an audience that can add comments.

Teachers use sites like Edublogs that provide students with more--and enjoyable--opportunities to write with purpose and relevance. Sites like Glogster and Storybird use videos and photes to complement student writing.

Another article listed a number of sites where students can practice writing, enter writing contests, and publish their work for a larger audience.

In one of my blogs last year, I talked about how many educators remain skeptical of technology in the classroom. Although we need to help students be digitally literate and develop a sense of self beyond the digital world, the benefits far outweigh the negatives to me.