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Games Better Than Books?
cellullama writes "Some of the leading video-game researchers are saying that games are better for teaching than textbooks. Three University of Wisconsin professors just said schools and corporate trainers should learn something from Halo 2 and Half-life. My workplace is already doing this (but don't tell my boss.)"
1. kids don't know they are learning.
;)
2. kids do things they find fun, and as much as we might try, they will learn from other kids that "reading isn't fun, playing games is fun" no matter how much fun reading really is or how suck the games really are.
so to that end I encourage having your kids play some of these games if they want to play games:
1. Typer Shark
2. Bookworm
And if you can find some old-school "Number Munchers" you're on your way to gaming-learning fun. I've placed these two games on desktops I've built for younger cousins and family friends, and the response has been quite good. They learn to type (Typer Shark, duh) and spell (Bookworm) in a creative and fun fashion.
(Me? I... uh... waste my brain away playing World of Warcraft, personally, but "I'm allowed to decide for myself, being 27" just don't tell the wife...
MORTAR COMBAT!
There is a modification package that allows you to play with the physics and features of Half-Life 2. It is very interesting what you can do in the physics world of Half-Life 2.
----- You know you have ego issues when you register a domain in your name.
Ahhh, the good old days! Those of you younger than 35 or so aren't going to remember how much fun it was learning about digital cicuit design on an Apple ][ with Rocky's Boots written by Warren Robinett -- the guy that hid his name in the Atari game Adventure and kicked off the whole easter egg craze.
"Lawyers are for sucks."
- Doug McKenzie
Yup, I read this in a book about 1980, and some of the research came from IBM. Some subjects are better taught through simulation and games than book study. Flying simulators are a good example of the interaction between physics and manipulating the real world. The CDC Plato project had an incredible success teaching chemistry through it's simulated lab. The AEC in Augusta was using the Atari game, "Meltdown" to teach the fundamentals of nuclear plant operations. As mentioned in the article, the military has been big on games and simulations for a long time.
I wonder why it was necessary for these guys to restate the obvious....
"The mind works quicker than you think!"
ummm.. I went to one of those highschools (The Hill School - Donald Trump's kid Eric was a grade behind me). I gotta tell you, you're way off. Dont get me wrong, you do a LOT of writing, but they also have one amazing IT Budget. Computers throughout the library, laptops required for all students, wireless access all over, high end digital video workstations, MCSE classes, programming classes, digital art classes. Almost all writing done out-of-class happens on the computer. Only in-class essays/etc are done with pen and paper.
I dont know where you've been.
This is pure nonsense. Interpretation is active; you have to decide how to interprete each word in a sentence to form a coherent (or incoherent) whole. The reader does the transportation to this "other time and place", not the book. As a reader, you form meaning from words and sentences by trial and error, and what you learn from it is far more important than what any game can teach you: Language. (Yes, you can learn language from gaming as well, but that's usually in some combination with reading, and language-learning games are usually quite simplistic.)