I thought I would start a post on articles that we run across that have to do with technology and education. This may be more appropriate for 661 but since many are taking both and everyone on here has some interest in technology I thought I would post some that I run across.
This one appeared in yesterday's NY Times.
Students Click, and a Quiz Becomes a Game
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8 comments:
Great article Mike. Thanks for sharing! I am an advocate for using games to enhance learning in the classroom. The student who stated that she did not enjoy the game because she did not need any more stress in her life . . . expressed a valid reason/concern. Her comment emphasizes a point that is often made. As we know there are different types of learners; auditory, kinesthetic, visual, etc., and we, as educators, should continue to design our curricula for each type of learner (when possible). In this example, there were only 2 students out of the group (assuming 16) who stated that they did not like the system and did not want to use it more often! Although these 2 students were in the minority, it is important that we remain focused on all students and ensure that exercises used will provide a variety of environments to help motivate and not alienate/de-motivate students to learn. (I'm sure in this case, the teacher was trying to motivate!)
I agree Pam, I always use games to review information learned. I have a colleague who is working on her Doctorate in Music Education and is going to make the focus of her dissertation much more about games than using a smart board. She is going to look into actual video games like guitar hero, sing star etc. I am interested to see if she has similar results, with some students not being interested, nor gaining anything from the game.
In our chat tonight, some of us were talking about the practicality of using computers and technology in the elementary classroom. I found this article tonight and thought I'd pass it on.
http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech057.shtml
Hey,I've used these in class. The Psyc. Department got a grant to use them as inovative teaching and they trained anyone who wanted to use them. Software is tricky as the article states and you have to be familiar to use it but once you get the nack it is really cool. I have it programed to work with one lesson in one class. It is time consuming to set up so I am planning to add one lesson a semester and see how it goes. The students love it though.
Mike, thanks for the article. Actually, I am not an advocate in using game for "teaching & learning." However, I guess, time changes, and the new generations are quite different...It's glad to learn more information about this with an open-mind for the future education.
Sophia
My first thought after reading this article was about the interactive trivia games at Damon's and other restaurants played on a projection screen competing with other players across the country. Imagine how much fun our students would have learning Science facts (or whatever) with a game like this. Thanks for sharing!
I like the idea of such "clickers" and it was so nice to see how students will actually get excited about studying for a test. I wonder if there will be more grants available to help get more of these tools into the classrooms...?
Games in education is the way to go. Even though some colleagues are not advocates for that but the reality is students are being raised by games. They go to school talk about games, get in front of a computer play games, go home play games so as educators we need to meet them right where they are. I have always said there are immigrants and citizens in the technology era. So lets try to educate our students with the tools available to them. If bigger corporations are starting to embrace training using games and even building structures in virtual worlds that means something about the direction of the future. We should be open enough to incorporate gaming activities in our classrooms.
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