VIDEO GAME Chapter 5

This chapter deals with a double-edged sword. To be able to learn, students need overt information. However, they often have a hard time handling it. So, they need immersion in actual contexts of practice, but they often find these experiences confusing unless they have overt information and guidance. Hmmm. Instead of choosing one over the other, we need to practice both in school. As students are immersed in experiments and problem solving, teachers should assess their progess and then give out overt information at the time the students need it. Then, the information the students learn will be useful to them. We know that students don't learn information as well when it is presented/taught out of context, so why do teachers continue to teach in isolation? Students need to see real world connections with the information they are learning. On the opposite hand, there needs to be a major shift in what information the state feels students should know and then how to assess the students, ie, box-and-whisker plots. I have an extremely hard time making a real-world connection to box-and-whisker plots that the students would find relevant.

Another key point made in this chapter concerned fundamental skills. In video games, players get to practice basic skills at the beginning of the game over and over again so they will learn them well. This is essential for game play. Players must be able to perform fundamental tasks well in order to master harder tasks later in the game. In school, students rarely get to practice a skill over and over again before moving on to harder skills. This is a key reason why students struggle with reading, writing, and math in general. Instead of immersing students in meaningful situations where they can practice a few fundamental skills over and over, we move them along through curriculum at a rapid pace. Our students end up mastering very little due to mile wide, inch deep standards. Sure, we expose them to tons of skills, but if students cannot apply them in real-world settings, have we really taught them anything?

Kelly, Heather and John