3. Project Description
Objective
To prove that video gaming enhances brain
development in opposition to the common myths
that video gaming kills brain cells.
Key Learning Methods Discussed
Creativity Enhancement
Manual Dexterity
Visual and Spatial Memory
4. Principles On Gaming: One
Empowered Learners
Co-Design the Game: How you make choices,
decisions, and actions makes you a co-designers.
The Customization Principle: Good games allow you
to solve problems in different ways. They also invite
you to try a different style than you normally would in
a low stakes environment.
Identity: Who am I going to be? What am I going to
get if I learn this? Invites you to become new type of
people with new skills, goals, and possibilities.
Manipulation: The games offers you tools to envolve
your mind and body in a very deep way.
5. Principles On Gaming: Two
Problem Based Learning:
Games are just interesting problem spaces. Gamers are given good tools, given
a lot of feedback, and good problem solving with a win state.
Well-Ordered Problems: Each level is meant to teach to the player to solve a
problem that will lead to better solutions at harder levels. Early problems set the
player up for later success (level design).
Pleasantly Frustration: Problem leads to good learning when you feel a challenge
yet you know that if you but effort in, you can find a solution. Regime of
Confidence.
The Cycle of Expertise: 1- Routine Problem. 2- Give a new challenge where the
routine does not work anymore and they have to alter it until it becomes then
routine.
Information: Language is effective when it is given just in time or it is given on
demand. Gamers can apply information immediately or when they need/want to
learn it.
The Fish Tank Principle: Put in information slowly to allow the players to
understanding the full array of complexity.
Sandbox: You are out in the world playing a game but you are protected. Have
time to explore before they have to level up. Need the time to play in the
sandbox. People can explore at their own pace. Low risk.
Skills as Strategies: Have to practice the same skills over again. Put the goals
under a goal or strategy that can be applied. Have a reason to use the skills you
learn right away.
6. Principles On Gaming: Three
Deep Understanding:
System Thinking:
Building a model in your head of how things interact.
Meaning as Action:
People understand words when they can associate it
with a goal, action, or experience. It’s the actions that
you are experiencing in the game that give them
meaning.
Model Based Reasoning:
The foundation of scientific reasoning.
7. Creativity Development
Children who play video games tend to be more
creative.
Researchers found that both boys and girls who
played games — violent or otherwise — tended to flex
more creative muscles than their non-gaming
counterparts.
A study of nearly 500 12-year-olds found that the
more kids played video games, the more creative they
were in tasks such as drawing pictures and writing
stories. In contrast, use of cell phones, the Internet
and computers (other than for video games) was
unrelated to creativity, the study found. - See more at:
http://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2011/video-game-
playing-tied-to-creativity/#sthash.WJYaapvb.dpuf
8. Manual Dexterity Enhancement
By playing video games, studies show that
there is a significant improvement in manual
dexterity.
A second study of 303 laparoscopic surgeons (82
percent men; 18 percent women) also showed
that surgeons who played video games requiring
spatial skills and hand dexterity and then
performed a drill testing these skills were
significantly faster at their first attempt and across
all 10 trials than the surgeons who did not the play
video games first.
http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2008/08/
video-games.aspx
9. Visual and Spatial Memory
The cover of Nature this month features study suggesting
that video games may improve brain function in certain
measurable ways.
The gam The study had 46 participants, aged 60-85, engage
in 12 hours of the training over the course of a month.
“…it turned out that the participants who’d been trained with
NeuroRacer and then took tests challenging their attention
and working memory did significantly better than the control
group. These kinds of cognitive capacities are known to
decrease with age, so the fact that they were apparently
boosted after the game training is important.”
http://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2013/09/05/can-
video-games-actually-improve-brain-and-cognitive-function/
10. Conclusion
Clearly there are many beneficial factors that
lead to learning from playing video games.
These are only a few. Hope you enjoyed!
Flip to the next slide for discussion questions!
11. Questions and Discussion:
Talk about games that you have played that you
believe have enhanced any of the learning
methods discussed.
What games?
What learning methods?
What other learning techniques and cognitive
development could be enhanced by playing video
games?
How could these learning methods be
implemented in schools today?
Have you heard of any interesting studies related
to the topic?
