I have thought often about motivation in my classes and in the classes I observed, and how I can achieve a even a modicum of interest and engagement in my little minions. In my observations I have seen normally sloth-like teens and pre-teens jump for joy or roll their eyes and then sit up straight in their desks at the mention of the word "game."
I have seen games work really well in Spanish and in Science classes. Games help spice up the monotony of the school day and usually incentivize the student to participate. Where I see the issue with games is with what the students are actually learning.
There are many questions and implications to be addressed. Are the games fulfilling some type of educational purpose and not just a behavioral tool to garner engagement? Are the games designed to help the students integrate information they already know deeper into their grey matter? Are the games designed to help students with rapid recall of information? Do the games demand problem solving skills and understanding of the material to come up with a solution?
Different types of games work well for different types of purposes and usually some types are more effective in a certain subject area than others. I have seen a science class learn about genetics through an online game where you breed your own dragons. I have seen a Spanish class use a website that works like Mad Libs to help use context clues for new vocabulary. These were both fun and effective.
What I have been struggling with is how to implement games in the English classroom. I want a game that doesn't require huge amounts of reading or writing, because that would turn the majority of my students off. Also, I don't know of a game that really does a good job incentivizing students to correct grammatically incorrect sentences. I think that a game like Words with Friends could work in my class especially if I could project the game on a screen and adapt it from a two player game to a two team game (taking the pressure off of just one individual- and also tapping into the idea of crowd-sourcing). Words with Friends is great because there are many ways you can access it; on Apple devices, Android devices and on Facebook.
On an partially related note, after class I was listening to NPR when the words 'role playing game' were said and my ears instantly perked up. It was a game about being a Russian immigration inspector, called "Papers, please" and thought it sounded like kind of a dreary game, I listened on, and found out that is kind of the point. You are placed in a game where you have to be a detective and your role is to be as thorough as possible. It exposes your to varying levels of politically loaded situations, like having to send back a refugee into a country where they might be killed, so that you do your job well, or letting them through and not following orders. As we are discussing the Holocaust in my English class right now, I felt elements of this game would be translatable for their discussion about what they have read about the people who though the banality of their actions allowed the mass extermination of a population occur. I am not sure how much class time I would devote to the game if I ever did decide to use it, but I am still ruminating on the idea. Take a look and let me know your thoughts.
Nice post, Caitlin! I understand what you mean when you say that you have never found a game that gets people to correct grammatical errors. I liked the Papers Please game that you described, and it made me think that as an English teacher, there may be a whole variety of games that you can find or create that would involve any given topic of human interest that you may be studying in your class. It seems like a great way to roll play and get students to put themselves in someone else's shoes.
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