1. Game On!
Liz Kolb
@lkolb
Clinical Assistant Professor
Laura Blanco, Elizabeth Pierce, Jami Sala, Erin Streyle, Jennifer Visscher,
and Sarah Zakem
University of Michigan Teaching Interns
3. 84% of children between the ages
of 8 to 10 have a video game
player in their household
4. Doctors who spent at least 3 hours a week
playing video games made about 37%
fewer mistakes in laparoscopic surgery
than their counterparts who did not play
video games.
5.
6. Why Everyday Video Games?
Games teach skills that employers want: analytical
thinking, team building, multitasking and problem-
solving under duress.
Unlike humans, the games never lose patience.
They are second nature to many kids.
There's already an audience; more than 45 million
homes have video-game consoles.
At-Risk students have shown to benefit from building
their own video games
21. Why African Safari?
Real experiences are more interesting and
exciting to write about. Students will get to
experience a “real” event by going on a digital
safari through the use of the Wii game system.
…it worked!
26. Adventure Journals Unit
Lesson 5:
How do writers choose a focus and
include relevant information?
- Playingthe game
27. Adventure Journals Unit
Lesson 6:
Writing our journals
Lesson 7:
How do writers choose a
title to hook the reader?
Lesson 8:
Illustrating our adventures
33. A little bit about Minecraft
Essentially a digital 3-D ―Lego‖
world!
Single or multi-player
2 possible modes:
survival mode
creative mode (we used)
Not free - $26.95 to download
35. Why we chose Minecraft
Student interest
Rave reviews in an informal class poll
A chance to engage in what our
students know and love
Accessible
Runs on desktop computers available
in almost every school
Open-ended teaching tool
Teacher guided – concepts
Student centered – task based
Can integrate CCSS
36. Our lesson: procedural writing
with Minecraft
What we did:
• Phase 1: Students
explored Minecraft and
chose a procedure
• Phase 2: Teacher
modeled how and when
to take screenshots
• Phase 3: Students went
through the procedure
and took screenshots
• Phase 4: Students wrote
procedural texts using
screenshots as a
framework
38. Our lesson: procedural writing
with Minecraft
Student reactions:
• Students engaged in the material because Minecraft is a
fun game that they enjoyed playing.
• The activity enhanced students’ learning of procedural
writing techniques.
• Students identified steps in the procedure using
screenshots as they went through the material.
• Potential for differentiation
• Choice of Minecraft procedure
• Procedural writing process
• Students were able to extend their learning by
experiencing a truly authentic purpose for their writing.
• Students took ownership of their work!
39. Implementation and Management
What we did that worked:
Materials
Choice of project (accessible to us)
What we might change:
Thinking about our resources:
Center-based vs. whole group instruction
Thinking about our students:
Timing
Pacing
41. Background: Selecting the Ticket to Ride
Application for the iPad
Selected this iPad application because I enjoy the
Ticket to Ride board game
Wanted to find an iPad application that would be
age-appropriate for upper-elementary students
Interested in finding an iPad application that would
engage, enhance, and extend students’ learning
about social studies
Impressed by the audio/visual features of the
Ticket to Ride application for the iPad, especially
the accompanying music
42. Rationale: Educational Affordances
Pros: age-appropriate for upper-elementary students;
students can learn the basic rules of the game relatively
quickly, but developing a game strategy (problem solving)
takes additional time (this could help students stay engaged
with the iPad application over a long period of time);
students can play against others who are present in the same
physical space or against computer robots; there are lots of
interdisciplinary connections across the curriculum
(mathematics, reading, science, social studies, and writing)
Cons: the game takes some time to play; the instructional
applications that I created take some time to implement
(e.g., it was hard to generate quick tasks with which
students could engage); only five players can play at one
time (both the board game version and the iPad application)
43. Using Ticket to Ride: Engaging, Enhancing,
and Extending Students’ Learning
Can engage, enhance, and extend students’ learning about
geography—spatial understanding, places and regions, and
human systems
Spatial understanding: children need to understand space
and relationships between things in space
Places and regions: children need to understand
characteristics of places and regions, as well as the
distinctions of these areas
Human systems (made of up people and their cultural and
settlement patterns): children need to understand three
forms of action—movement, cooperation, and conflict
44. Planning with Ticket to Ride: Unit and
Lesson Planning
Instructional Application 1: ―Tour Books‖ of American
and Canadian Cities (social studies and writing unit)
Instructional Application 2: Creating a Map Scale for the
Ticket to Ride Map Game Board (inquiry-based
mathematics lesson)
Instructional Application 3: There’s a Train a-Coming!
(interdisciplinary thematic unit)
47. Congratulations! What Worked Well!
Establishing clear behavior guidelines
Co-constructing rules and expectations with students
Make it clear at the beginning that everyone will have
an opportunity to experience the game (ie. Playing at
recess)
Authenticity of purpose
Model processes and give examples
Letting students explore the game before they engage
in academic material
48. Game Over…What did Not Work Well!
Time limitations made it so that we focused more on
using the technology than on the writing process
Not knowing what we were getting into (some games
are more challenging than others)
Expecting too much or too little of our students
49. Hints and Tips for Implementing
Everyday Games…
Find out what students already know/use
Set up and practice using the game system in the
classroom before the lesson
Know the aspects of the game that are likely to be
accessible to all students as well as what could be
challenging before introducing it to students
Consider your resources and what is reasonable for your
students
Play a clip of the accompanying music (entrance music and game music)
Spatial understanding, places and regions, and human systems are all elements of geographic understanding (Lee, Visualizing Elementary Social Studies Methods, 2008)
Have a game set up for four players (Erin, Jami, Laura, Liz, and/or Sarah), and model some of the features of the game and the language that you can encourage students to use while playing the game (this shows that it does not need a lot of set up, which is not a feature of the Instructional Applications that I created), such as cardinal directions in which they are moving and the approximate distances they are traveling.
