Video Games and Education

1
Video Games and Education

• Nick Schiner
• Neil Bongiovanni
• Ashley Beasley

2
Benefits of Video Games

• Video games require skills such as problem
  solving, analytical thinking, and adaptation to
  rapid change.
• Good for team building.
• Games offer clear goals for students to follow in
  an environment that is low-consequence-for-failure
  .
• Complex and diverse approach to learning
  processes.
• Interactivity
• Incentive to participate in activities.

3
Some Reasons for Video Game Implementation

• According to the journal article What teachers
  need to know about the Video Game Generation,
  David Sousa feels that the way American schools
  are now could make it hard for some students who
  might do extremely well in another type of
  learning environment. A quote from the article
  states video games cross all cultural and ethnic
  boundaries. Not recognizing that these shared
  experiences exist, public education has failed to
  provide the impact of that experience on students
  learning.
• The article also shows that certain things in
  video games are different from classrooms such as
  the level of motivation and the empowerment of
  the student, both of which seem to be better
  affected by video games than classroom learning.
• This article makes it know that it is very
  important to explore the creative and
  technological avenues which are video games in
  education.

4
Learning Outcomes of Video Games in Education

• Computers are known to have many benefits
• Another thing that is good about video games in
  education is that there can be multiple attempts,
  thus giving the student even more room to learn
  and grow from it, they can also manipulate what
  they do the next time.
• According to the article Kilpatrick has four
  levels of evaluation of a learning game
• Reaction
• Learning (how much knowledge is gained)
• Behavior
• Results

5
Enhancing Children Socially

• Children also had an opportunity to enter into
  play in a structured setting.
• Video Games also gave them a popular topic to
  talk about with each other.

6
Video Games in Physical Education

• A study by the California Department of
  Education found that students who did just 10
  minutes of rhythmic aerobics before a
  standardized test performed up to 25 percent
  better on the test than students who received 20
  minutes of test-specific tutoring. And a recent
  research article by the National Institute for
  Health Care Management Foundation reported that
  breaks for physical activity during the school
  day can help children to be more focused and
  better able to learn.

7
What is Dance Dance Revolution?

• Video game with controller that is actually a
  sensor-lined vinyl dance pad connected to a video
  game console and TV which plays popular or hip-
  hop music.
• A player will stand the game pad which consists
  of four arrows pointing up, down, right, and
  left.
• When the game begins the music starts and colored
  arrows scroll up from the bottom of the screen.
  As the arrows pass through a set of transparent
  arrows at the top of the screen the player must
  step on the corresponding arrow on the dance pad.
  There is a dance gauge and finally, the player
  gets a letter grade at the end of the song.

8
Video Games in Physical Education

• It is estimated that by 2010 around 1,500 P.E.
  classrooms will be using Dance Dance Revolution
  alone.
• West Virginia was so impressed by their pilot
  program of implementing DDR that they mandated it
  into all of their middle and junior high schools.

9
Video Games in Musical Education

• Because of their success with DDR many West
  Virginia classes are trying Guitar Hero.
• Piano Wizard is also proving to be a great
  educational opportunity.

10
Gaming in Other Areas of Education

• The Federation of American Scientists is
  currently piloting games in middle and high
  schools.
• Immune attack which teaches about biology and the
  immune system.
• Discover Babylon which is a history game focused
  on Mesopotamia.
• Soda Constructor

11
Games for Teachers

• Game in development called SimSchool.
• Software imports real demographic data of a
  school district (i.e. student performance,
  personality, racial makeup).
• Teachers then teach their lesson plan and the
  game gives them feedback on how well it may work.
• If we give them good educational games during
  training, it will be a model for them on how to
  integrate games into their own classrooms.
  -David Gibson, codirector of SimSchool.

12
Reasons Against Video Games

• High development cost of games and low
  profitability of educational games.
• Schools are reluctant to give up textbooks.
• Parents/Educators negative feelings toward video
  games.
• Skills learned from video games may not be able
  to be tested by todays examinations.
• Schools are slow to adopt new technologies.

13
The children were also highly motivated to
complete any activities that stood between them
and playing video games.

• This study showed that these kindergarten
  students were more than willing to do things that
  they normally would not do in order to be allowed
  to play video games. This includes even the
  normally picky eaters finishing all their food.