Themes+of+over+200+articles

Zeus:
Generally speaking, games don’t seem to teach us dick.

Let’s face it. Hand eye coordination. Motivation. A teeny glimpse into our cognitive capacity. The ability to socialize. This is all we’ve got to say for two hundred articles and six weeks of gaming demonstrations. Hell, the BEST thing I’ve seen so far is that it can help in developmentally challenging times for a young kid, to teach socialization to people who can’t get out and do it themselves – in otherwords, it’s a crutch. A not-as-effectiv-as-real-opportunity-but-decent-if-its-all-you-can-get kind of crutch. [---Mike: I think this is true of commercial games used without additional context or modification... but what of [|Quest Atlantis], [|River City], [|Arden: World of Shakespeare], [|Playable Fictions] and other intentionally educational game-like environments?] [Zeus - Just a matter of interest, but I typically don't find interest in purly academic games. If the game is incapable of being adopted, then it is of little importance to me. I understand how those of you more interested in the academics of teaching would be of a different opinion, however] [Mike: Define "adopted"- QA has 50,000 users world-wide]

[Mike: One exception might be the unique affordance of commercial massively multiplayer games for language pick-up. When you ask language teachers what would be the optimal environment for learning a new language, they inevitably point to immersion in the language and culture, plus exolingual scaffolding to ensure the "real world" presents the complexity of language in a sequenced and phased in manner. Virtual world afford immersion and levels in ways even the real world cannot provide.]

I feel like we should write a paper called “To hope of more than staving off boredom: if we’re going to do it anyway, what small bonus can we get out of videogames?” [Mike-- again.. I think the distinction here is unaltered commercial games vs. modified or ed-designed games]

So… with that rather depressing outlook aside, I did find a very small number of articles that I thought were worth looking into.

I can’t seem to care about motivation. I mean… so what if computer games, after 20 hours of play, get ½ hour of learning history in the mix somewhere? Kid, just buckle down and read the damned history book. You’ve got to learn discipline sometime. So I’m chucking motivation. [Mike: Doesn't the kid learn history in a very different way if they've "played" it?][zeus - they do, but games take SO long to play. I've never been sold as to the efficiency of games]

Same with camradarie. I can’t bring myself to care if someone gleans a bit of social interaction online. Unless we’re comparing it to how much social interaction they get out of attending school, doing a hobby or a similar thing, it just doesn’t mean anything. And somethign tells me that you get a fraction of the social interaction out of a 6 hour day of warcraft than you would from a .5 hour playtime at recess. [Mike: Not just friends, leadership and organization skills.. and, sure, a good drug dealer gets those same experiences... organizing people, making team decisions and getting them implemented, but... well.. games seem better for that]

The remaining 66 greens were looked at.

There is definitely a category of “the kinds of impact video games have”. Whether it’s “how much are we really getting out of this” or “what effect does video gaming have on learning”… similar, and possibly interesting.

Altogether I found 14 of those that are green, haven’t gone through the orange literature.

I found ten green articles that fit the category of “using video games to teach something in place where we might have no other tools to do so”. This is particularly interesting literature to me, because it shows where videogames might actually have a place in the world. It doesn’t matter if they teach math… poorly. It only matters when they’re the best at what they do, because that makes them worthy… educationally, of the time committed to both teaching with them, learning different teaching styles, and playing them as a student. [Mike: Please list the 10 focus articles so we can all read and react-- our advantage here, if we have one, is having 10 points of view synthesized so let's try to co-labor here]

deHaan, J. (2009). Video games and second language acquisition: The effect of interactivity with a rhythm video game on second language vocabulary recall, cognitive load, and telepresence. Dissertation Abstracts International Section A, 69. Din, F. S., & Calao, J. (2001). The effects of playing educational video games on kindergarten achievement. Child Study Journal, 31(2), 95-102. Drew, B., & Waters, J. (1985). Video Games: Utilization of a Novel Strategy to Improve Perceptual-Motor Skills in the Non-Institutionalized Elderly. Duque, G., Fung, S., Mallet, L., Posel, N., & Fleiszer, D. (2008). Learning while having fun: The use of video gaming to teach geriatric house calls to medical students. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society,56(7), 1328-1332. doi:10.1111/j.1532-5415.2008.01759.x. Lauricella, A. R., Pempek, T. A., Barr, R., Calvert, S. L. (2010). Contingent computer interactions for young children's object retrieval success. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 31 (5), p362-369. Okolo, C. M. (1992). Reflections on 'the effect of computer-assisted instruction format and initial attitude on the arithmetic facts proficiency and continuing motivation of students with learning disabilities.'. Exceptionality, 3(4), 255-258. Okolo, C. M. (1992). The effect of computer-assisted instruction format and initial attitude on the arithmetic facts proficiency and continuing motivation of students with learning disabilities. Exceptionality, 3(4), 195-211. Piirainen–Marsh, A., & Tainio, L. (2009). Collaborative game-play as a site for participation and situated learning of a second language. Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, 53(2), 167-183. Williams, A., Rouse, K., Seals, C., & Gilbert, J. (2009). Enhancing reading literacy in elementary children using programming for scientific simulations.International Journal on E-Learning, 8(1), 57-69. Zheng, D. (2006). Affordances of three-dimensional virtual environments for english language learning: An ecological psychological analysis. ProQuest Information & Learning). Dissertation Abstracts International Section A: Humanities and Social Sciences, 67 (6-) Zheng, D., Young, M. F., Wagner, M. M., & Brewer, R. A. (2009). Negotiation for action: English language learning in game-based virtual worlds. Modern Language Journal, 93(4), 489-511.