The first session that I attended, and would like to
spend the majority of this blog discussing, was led by the University of
Michigan's own Liz Kolb. Liz's session
was entitled "I am PAC-MAN: Learning Through Gamification." I felt the need to go to Liz's speech for a
couple of reasons. First, I find the
concept of gamification within the classroom to be a really fascinating
concept, and one that I could see myself trying to adopt in my own classroom
one day. Secondly, having taken Jeff's
class last semester that dealt with gaming and simulation, I could really
relate to her ideas and concepts. I
thought it was really interesting that Liz decided to switch every aspect of
her class to recreate a gaming style classroom.
By this, I mean she changed her class format from administering grades
to administering experience points. Additionally,
instead of giving homework and tests, she administers quests (assignments) that
students go on to complete at their own pace.
I really like the pacing option which gives students the opportunity to
learn at their own pace.
I also thought that it was really unique that upon
completing a quest, students can receive badges symbolizing their mastery of a
particular subject. Moreover, each
teacher can create and personalize their own badges that they wish for students
to complete. Also, just like any normal
video game, students can level-up the more badges they receive. One interesting aspect that Liz stated was
that these badges can follow students around and can be used to symbolize their
mastery of a real-world skill. So if a
student receives a badge symbolizing their mastery of Microsoft Excel, then
they could quite possibly place this achievement on their resume. All in all, I really enjoyed Liz's presentation
and seminar and definitely walked away with some great insight that I can use
within the walls of my classroom. I look
forward to sharing the knowledge and insight I gained at MACUL with my fellow
teachers at John Glenn High School.
The idea of turning the classroom into some sort of video game has always intrigued me, so I was excited to see you were going to write about this session! I've read one other person's take on Liz Kolb's session and they thought it was very informative as well. I wonder how you see a gaming classroom playing out in the social science and history classrooms? I think it would make the most sense in regards to developing units. I wonder if this could be a form of differentiation? The biggest issue that I see coming up is what you would do with the students who have no interested in a "game" classroom. There are plenty of students who would probably prefer the different, traditional classroom and I'm not sure how you would balance that classroom with a game classroom. Thoughts? It seems as though the answer lies somewhere in technology, and based on your post that is what Liz was saying as well. Using the badges and the technology at our disposal via the internet, it might be possible to make the classroom into a game of sorts. The question is, what sort of video game? I always have the xbox achievements framework in mind, and I think that could be very appealing to students who enjoy playing video games; especially because the overlap of these students and students who are not interested in school is fairly large based on my own experiences. Anyway, nice post and definitely something to think about!
ReplyDeleteHey Bud!
ReplyDeleteYour post comes at such an opportune time for me after seeing the pomegranate labs presentation after our poster presentations tonight which talked about gameification. In fact, they noted a couple points that really made me think and directly relate to what you said. They said you have to actually change parts of your curriculum and the way almost all of of us view school and classrooms to be able to make it a game - not just change what you call things. Calling grades XP points, and homework assignments QUESTS doesn't inherently change what they are, only what you are referring to them as. They said this won't make the student more apt to do them than the actual homework called "homework." what do you think? Did Liz mention changing the actual properties of the work other than the names? I'd love to hear more!
First, I would like to piggyback off of our colleagues, Casey S. and Ms. Stilman. After reading your post, and after our poster presentations last night, how would you differentiate a class in which some students do not want a gamified education? Would students in your classroom also have to be in a school in which gamification was central to learning? Or, do you think it possible to have some students in the same class as others in which pedagogy was gamified only for some? In addition, if you are to change the culture of a classroom and/or school, Ms. Stilman raises some interesting questions about how you sell a truly gamified pedagogy to students. Building on their comments and on your original post about introducing this idea to your colleagues at your placement, what do you see as the major challenges to gamifying (and, therefore, changing) both a classroom and a school culture/climate? How do you sell it to colleagues? What limitations are there at your present placement? Change can't happen unless someone speaks up, but do you honestly foresee your placement colleagues and students buying in to such a pedagogy? What options do you have in a school that lacks a high-tech technological infrastructure? Is it possible to gamify things with low-tech options? If the pedagogy is contingent upon a high-tech infrastructure, what do teachers do if there is an issue with technology working for the day or some longer, extended period of time?
ReplyDeleteHello Andrew!
ReplyDeleteI've thought about the same thing before. I attended a class about gamifying education and this is definitely something that I would like to set up in my classroom at some point in time. I was just talking about this structure in a different comment. It's odd to me that many teachers would start their class off at 100%. That's similar to having everyone start at the max level and deducting experience points as they make mistakes. That doesn't happen. Students don't start off with the knowledge they need to pass the class. They must work to gain that knowledge. For me, it seems that the structure of the class works to gain student engagement. Do you for see any other uses or other benefits other than just engagement and a mastery based class?
Andrew,
ReplyDeleteI'd be interested to see how you might incorporate into your specific classes with your specific content. For example, Microsoft Excel may not be a badge that a student would earn in history class, so what might they earn? This is where I think gamification gets really interesting, because it forces us to consider if/how we can parse out skills that seem so interconnected. For example, how might a student earn a badge for demonstrating close reading skills of a primary text? Lots to think about here. I'm glad you enjoyed the conference.