Vermont Technical College
Video Games and Education
The use of Video Games in the School Curriculum
Zachary Colosa
ENG 1060-T1 - Freshman Composition
Christopher Smith
5/2/2014
Abstract
This research paper will discuss the past, present, and potential future of the use of video games in education. More specifically, it will touch on the history of the use of video games in learning, such as instances where video games were successfully (or unsuccessfully) used as learning tools. This research paper will also discuss the modern benefits of using video games as learning tools, mostly the key reasons why video games should be considered by educators as potential learning tools. Furthermore, this research paper will discuss the many reasons why educators are so hesitant to attempt to phase in computer/video game based learning, mostly why schools in general have been disinclined to do so. Finally, this research paper will discuss the future potential of video games being used as learning tools, such as the reasons why video games should or shouldn’t be used for education purpose, and also the theory of Gamification.
Introduction
Gamification is on the rise in many aspects of the modern world, especially in use in education. So what is Gamification? Gamification is “the concept of applying game-design thinking to non-game applications to make them more fun and engaging” (Badgeville, 2014). Basically, it’s the attempt to make things that aren’t generally considered fun, and applying certain qualities from games to them in an attempt to make them fun and engaging. This research paper will touch on the history of how video games have already been used in an educational environment, the overall benefits of using video games as learning tools, what makes educators so hesitant to phase in video game based learning, and the future potential of video game education through the use of Gamification.
Section I: A Brief History of the Use of Video Games in Education
Over a century ago, “John Dewey argued that schools are built on a fact fetish, and it is still true today,”(Shaffer, 2004) which basically means that the current education system is built on the thought that the best way to measure good teaching is through the students’ ability to recite “learned” facts on tests.
The following excerpt is taken from Kurt Squire’s paper on “Video Games and Education: Designing learning systems for an interactive age”:
It is worth pausing to recall that play is among the oldest forms of learning; watch animals learn to hunt and you see them playing in simulated hunts. In the military, games and simulations have been used for thousands of years. Indeed, historically speaking, it is not the notion of learning through play that is so strange; it is the notion of sitting in rows of chairs, faced forward, everyone locked on to a fixed speaker or content provider that is strange, a vestige of the industrial era and its fixation of efficiency. (Squire, 2008)
This long quote addresses the fact that historically speaking, modern teaching strategies are actually stranger than using recreational activity for educational purpose. How can one say that play is an abnormal method of teaching when it is seen in nature all the time in every era. The concept of learning through play is no different than becoming stronger through strenuous activity, as both are the natural way that humans are meant to grow and develop, mentally and physically. If exercise wasn’t the way to become stronger, then why are humans born with endorphins specifically made for promoting a natural high, activated through exercise and sexual activity to make people feel incredible while preforming these activities? The same is true with “mirror neurons” in the brain, which are meant to collect information seen by one human viewing another, allowing them to attempt to replicate their actions. In other words, if humans weren’t meant to interact with and learn from each other, developing in groups, then we wouldn’t be born with special neurons that allow us to copy other humans.
Section II: The Benefits of Using Video Games as Learning Tools
There are many benefits to using video games as learning tools. For example, because video games are fun and engaging, by transferring educational content in to a video game platform, the idea is that because the student will be engaged in the environment, not only will they learn the content to levels beyond what would be possible through a standard classroom lecture, but the student would more than likely enjoy it. Not only that, but because they’re having fun while doing it, the content will better manifest itself within the child’s mind. While it’s great that games are fun and engaging, “games also require deep thinking; just think of how chess is a canonical problem solving exercise for artificial intelligence programmers” (Squire, 2008). The reason that chess is used in this sense is that to truly create artificial intelligence, it must be known that the AI can make its own decisions based on logic, and what better way than using a game that involves countless possible scenarios like chess, checkers, or any other game of the like. Likewise, video games can be used to engage the students in their learning to a significantly higher degree than a teacher ever could.
“To know is a verb before it is a noun, knowledge. We learn by doing—not just by doing any old thing, but doing something as part of a larger community of people who share common goals and ways of achieving those goals”(Shaffer et al. 2004). Basically, by accomplishing something together as a group, the entire community’s way of understanding becomes further developed.
One such instance of a large number of people working together towards a common goal in video games comes from any massive multi-player online game, commonly referred to as MMO’s. Although not in any way intended to be an educational game, an example of an MMO is World of Warcraft. In this game, groups of 10-25 take on cooperative missions involving using the abilities they have in synergy with the common goal of taking down difficult bosses, with three different subtypes of players: the healers, the tanks, and the DPS. The healers have the job of keeping everyone in the group alive, most notably the tank which has the job of taking the primary focus of the enemy forces so that the DPS (damage dealers with low defenses) can do as much damage as possible without much fear of dying. By working together with the same goal, every member of the party gains knowledge, and eventually they may be able to be the leader of the group themselves one day (the guy that explains strategy, makes calls, and dishes out new equipment for defeating certain bosses). Although World of Warcraft in no way was ever intended to be an educational game, the people involved still learn quite a bit on that specific subject through hands on experience in a few hours.This amount of experience is much more than a student will learn about a specific subject by learning through conventional methods of repetition.
If these aspects of group work could also apply to school work in the education sense, then by working together towards a common goal of solving a complex problem, a group of students that all participated and contributed towards solving the problem would all gain hand on experience.This experience would last them much longer thansimply until the next test, where they will likely forget what they have learned, meaning that they will have to learn it again later, again and again, until they understand the content. The point is that the value of working together towards a common goal is worlds beyond working alone on a problem that the student couldn’t care less about.
Section III: Hesitations in the Educational Community to Use Video Games
One of the major problems involved in actually using video games in education is hesitation of the educational community to try them out as potential learning tools. This is unfortunate, because of the huge potential involved in game based learning. One of the major benefits of using video games as educational tools is simply the vast number of young people that play video games anyway. According to national statistics, in 2008, a whopping 97% of students reportedly played video games (Steinkuehler et al. 2012). So, if so many students are playing video games anyway, why do so few educators actually try and use video games for educational purpose? One reason, among many is that it is commonly believed that video games dull the mind, when, in fact, educational games can often sharpen the mind much more than any one lecture ever could. Even video games that aren’t created with the intent to teach sharpen certain aspects of a child’s mind, except that those aspects are usually game strategy, and not actual educationally useful material.
It is commonly believed by parents and teachers that grew up in an age void of the video games of the modern world that video games “taint children’s brains” (Palmer, 2013). While it is true that excessive use of video games can, in fact, cause students to do poorly in school, this is because the student made the decision to pay little mind to their homework, and to play the video game instead. It’s not that video games taint the brain, but rather that not doing the homework and playing the game is more or less the same as just not doing the homework. In addition to this, there was also a new study conducted at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and Charité University Medicine St. Hedwig-Krankenhaus. This study found a direct connection between playing video games and growth in the areas of the brain involving spatial orientation, memory formation, strategic planning, and motor skills (Palmer, 2013). This means that the value of video games has been heavily dismissed by educators and parents everywhere, because the skillset gained from playing games can actually be of use in a real world setting. To give an example of this, my brother and I played quite a bit of games in our youth, and I can say from experience that both of us have developed a great sense of direction and spatial orientation. On the contrary, one of my parents who never played video games a day in their life has the worst sense of direction that anyone could possibly have. I realize that the “case study” of three people isn’t exactly the most accurate data, but it does show that perhaps video games do in fact have a significant influence in that section of the brain. For this reason, I believe that video games can in fact have a positive influence on the development of children’s brains.
Another commonly believed aspect of video games is that they encourage aggressive behavior. Many studies, on the other hand, have found that rather than encouraging aggressive behavior, video games are more of a positive way for students to vent their frustrations. One such study done by Anthony Palmer found that by allowing one of his students that often acted out during class to use an iPad for the class reading and math lesson, during which the student no longer acted out and showed the calm side of himself that the teacher had never seen before (Palmer, 2013).
Although it is true that playing especially violent video games can encourage violent behavior in some children, it then falls to the parents to filter which games aren’t okay for their children to play.
These are just a couple of the commonly believed facts, that aren’t necessarily actual facts in most cases, but enough for educators to justify not using technology and video games in the classroom.
Section IV: The Future of Gamification in Education
As defined in the introduction, Gamification is “the concept of applying game-design thinking to non-game applications to make them more fun and engaging” (Badgeville, 2014), a concept that has begun to take the world by storm. In present day, there are many annual tech camps today that involve learning through video games, and though many are more advanced than the elementary school setting (learning coding, graphic art, and game design), Gamification is still being used today as a form of learning. In fact, several of the tech camps host elementary school students, one such camp being a camp on “Adventures in Game Design”, meant for kids 7-10 year olds, and another camp on “3-D Game Design with Minecraft” for kids 9-12 years old. The point is that whether people like it or not, technology is simply not something that can simply be ignored by the educational community. Eventually, whether it be sooner or later, video game based learning will start gaining popularity in schools. My personal opinion is that someday video game based learning will be a widely accepted, and normal part of early schooling curriculums.
According to a survey of people, 53% of people believe that “by 2020, there will have been significant advances in the adoption and use of Gamification” (Burke, 2012). Although not a staggering majority, the survey does raise the idea that the potential of Gamification being adopted by educators is higher than ever before now in what is being called the Digital Age.
In Conclusion
The probability of Gamification being widely accepted by the masses is higher than ever before, potentially so by the year 2020. When it comes to pass that Gamification grows to this level, the it is only natural that the federal government will have to take action, and either accept or deny the usefulness that it brings to the educational environment. This goes to show the evolution of the education system, going from play to standardized lectures, and from lectures to the future of technologically assisted teaching. Chances are that within the next decade, whether Gamification is accepted in to the educational community or not, the current method of teaching will radically changeas more and more technology becomes available. A new age is dawning; an age of computers, known even now as the Digital Age.
Works Cited
Burke, Brian. (November 2012). “Gamification 2020: What is the Future of Gamification?”. Retrieved From:
Palmer, Anthony. (November, 2013). “Lies about video games”. Retrieved From:
Shaffer, David W., Squire, Kurt R., Halverson, Richard., & Gee, James P. (December 2004). “Video games and the future of learning”. Retrieved From:
Squire, Kurt. (July 2002). “Cultural Framing of Computer/Video Games”. Retrieved From:
Squire, Kurt. (2003). “Video Games in Education”. Retrieved From:
Squire, Kurt D. (2008). “Video Games and Education: Designing learning systems for an interactive age”. Retrieved From:
Steinkuehler, Constance., Squire, Kurt., & Barab, Sasha. (2012). Games, Learning, and Society: Learning and Meaning in the Digital Age. Cambridge University: Cambridge University Press.