Video games model the best teaching strategies, writes neurologist Judy Wills on Edutopia.
Games insert players at their achievable challenge level and reward player effort and practice with acknowledgement of incremental goal progress, not just final product.
When players meet a challenge, dopamine is released, producing deep satisfaction, Wills writes. A task that’s too easy or too difficult won’t activate the dopamine reward circuit.
MRI and cognitive studies reveal that the brain “evaluates” the probability of effort resulting in success before expending the cognitive effort in solving mental problems. If the challenge seems too high, or students have a fixed mindset related past failures that they will not succeed in a subject or topic, the brain is not likely to expend the effort needed to achieve the challenge.
Video games let players move quickly to their level. They’re not stuck at level one just because other players haven’t mastered the skills yet. They want to work harder — to move to a higher level — because it feels so good to win. That model works for classroom learning too, Wills argues.
The best on-line learning programs for building students’ missing foundational knowledge use student responses to structure learning at individualized achievable challenge levels. These programs also provide timely corrective and progress-acknowledging feedback that allows the students to correct mistakes, build understanding progressively, and recognize their incremental progress.
Game designers provide “just in time” information to players, said researcher James Gee at a MacArthur Foundation seminar reported on HechingerEd.
. . . (In) the strategy game Civilization . . . players can access a “civilopedia” that contains details on the various game concepts, civilizations and units featured in the game.
“In school, information is given to you whether you want it or not and never just in time,” Gee said. “You’re not going to use the 500 pages until you finish them, and by that time you can’t remember what was on the second page.”
Many games track players’ performance throughout their playing time, showing where they faced problems. That kind of detailed feedback would be useful to teachers, Gee said.
Update: “Just-in-time learning” doesn’t work for math, argues Barry Garelick.
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Roger Sweeny says: April 18, 2011 at 10:32 amMaybe this is too obvious to be worth stating, but the strategy outlined in the post is impossible in any remotely heterogeneous classroom.
SuperSub says: April 18, 2011 at 1:35 pmMore importantly, to achieve the feedback necessary any current conceptual lessons would need to be broken down into individual concrete skills, which seems to be a no-no currently.
tim-10-ber says: April 18, 2011 at 2:41 pmJust how does what one “masters” on a video game get captured on a real test?
Mark Roulo says: April 18, 2011 at 3:42 pmJust how does what one “masters” on a video game get captured on a real test?
I think the point is that video games tend to ramp the players up so that after ‘N’ hours the player is measurably better. One of the ways that they do this is by providing incrementally harder challenges. The games also provide a tight feedback loop and the players can move at their own speed … I don’t have to go to level 18 just because everyone else is. If I’m having problems with level 10, I can (and probably will) stay there until I’ve mastered/beaten it.
Lightly Seasoned says: April 18, 2011 at 5:08 pm“Just-in-time” learning? Wow, we’re not even pretending that school isn’t an assembly line anymore. You know, I can teach you how to identify a metaphor just in time for test prep. This method is EXACTLY how one teaches to the test.
Stacy in NJ says: April 18, 2011 at 5:58 pmMost games have three levels: beginner, intermediate, and advanced. You can “win” the game (travel through all individuals elements or challenges) at each level. It incrementally ramps up, and then up, and then up. You can repeat any particular challenge as many times as you need to to master it. It may only take player A 10 hours to beat the game at the most advanced level; Player B may need double or triple the play time to reach the same level. But once a player has beaten any game, it is likely it wil take them less time to beat the next game and less time for the next. And that’s the really interesting aspect of game theory.
Cranberry says: April 18, 2011 at 6:54 pmCivilization’s a great game. It is, however, only a game, and the players do learn how to beat the game. They don’t learn all the definitions, only those which are most effective or most lucrative.
I find this statement hard to accept: “In school, information is given to you whether you want it or not and never just in time,” Gee said. “You’re not going to use the 500 pages until you finish them, and by that time you can’t remember what was on the second page.”
Some of us remember. If I have to choose between Gee and E.D. Hirsch, I’ll choose Hirsch. If everyone had to look up (or be given) facts “just in time,” no one would ever be able to study law, history or medicine.
Gamers can create challenges for one another that create learning opportunities. Gee cited an example focused on the popular life-simulation game The Sims. Players were challenged, in one case, to play the entire game as an impoverished single parent and then create a graphic novel about their experiences. “That sounds like a pretty good social-sciences assignment, right?” Gee said.
That sounds like a very slow-moving social sciences class, with a very undemanding, but time-consuming project. I’d rather my child were required to read “How the Other Half Lives,” by Jacob Riis, then to write a book report. (http://www.bartleby.com/208/) I think he’d learn more from reading that book than from playing a game set in an artificial environment.
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