This section originally created by Natasha Boskic
Canadian Games Studies Association (CGSA)
Digital Games Research Association (DiGRA)
Participatory Play: Digital Games From Spacewar! to Virtual Peace
The Joan Ganz Cooney Centre, Sesame Workshop
The Education Arcade, MIT explores games that promote learning through authentic and engaging play. TEA’s research and development projects focus both on the learning that naturally occurs in popular commercial games, and on the design of games that more vigorously address the educational needs of players.
This HASTAC Discussion Forum is co-hosted by Duke graduate students Lindsey Andrews and Patrick Jagoda who work on the Virtual Peace project. “Virtual Peace” is a digital humanitarian assistance game that creates a learning environment for young people studying public policy and international relations. The game has been developed by repurposing an existing military simulation into a tool for humanitarian training. Learning within the game focuses on leadership skills, cultural awareness, problem solving, and adaptive thinking–all of which are necessary to coordinate international humanitarian assistance for natural disaster relief. The Virtual Peace Project was one of the winners of the 2007 HASTAC/MacArthur Foundation Digital Media and Learning Competition
This is what the hosts say about the forum:
“Participatory Play: Digital Games From Spacewar! to Virtual Peace” explores game innovations that surpass violent first-person shooters and military training simulations. Starting with the early history of games, we focus on recent productions that are pushing the boundaries of digital interactive gameplay. We will explore the theoretical and pedagogical issues surrounding video games. Among other topics, we’ll consider the relationship between game play and game theory, changing trends in gaming culture, scholarly collaborations on game design, pedagogical uses of video games, and the social, political and cultural implications of online worlds.
CyGaMEs. Research that shows how playing a well-designed video game can enhance learning has been conducted by Dr. Debbie Denise Reese and her team at the Center for Educational Technologies® (CET) at Wheeling Jesuit University.
The CyGaMEs (Cyberlearning through Game-based, Metaphor Enhanced Learning Objects) project was funded by National Science Foundation in 2008 for two years, after NASA’s initial involvement from 2006. The project was presented at Congress in Washington, DC in November 2009 with a goal to educate members of Congress, their staff, and other interested people about the use of technology at all levels of education.
Through a created video game Selene: A Lunar Construction GaME, the players learn how Earth’s moon was formed as they create their own moon. Dr. Reese claims that Selene’ enhances learning. She says that “after playing ‘Selene,’ our tweens, teens and undergraduates can infer how the moon formed and how it changed over time. They also make inferences about the physics of collisions.”
For their work, Dr. Debbie Denise Reese and her team has already won a number of awards since 2006. CyGaMEs project will release Selene II in spring 2010. Version II will support up to 3,500 concurrent players and classes as large as 30 simultaneous students.
You can read more about this game or participate in the research by visiting the game website at http://selene.cet.edu/This site contains over 50 papers, reports and presentations by Dr. Reese and her team.
Games for Change Barak Obama has announced a number of initiatives to improve the teaching of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). One of these initiatives are two competitions for developing video games for these subject areas. Supporting President Obama’s call for a renewed focus on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) education, the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) and the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI), Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA), Microsoft Corporation, and the MacArthur Foundation announced a suite of multi-faceted efforts to engage and motivate students in STEM learning. The organizations will work to harness the excitement surrounding computer and video games through a series of STEM-related video game design competitions.
Dr. Tony Bates is the author of eleven books in the field of online learning and distance education. He has provided consulting services specializing in training in the planning and management of online learning and distance education, working with over 40 organizations in 25 countries. Tony is a Research Associate with Contact North | Contact Nord, Ontario’s Distance Education & Training Network.