Gamification in EdTech

We play games every day, and it is a wonder how closely our...

Mon, 20 Aug 2012 14:14:38 -0400

We play games every day, and it is a wonder how closely our imagined games mimic the games in the minds of the people around us.

Even Forbes likes gamification

Wed, 15 Aug 2012 12:22:47 -0400

Even Forbes likes gamification

EdTech is not a panacea

Mon, 16 Jul 2012 09:08:48 -0400

EdTech is not a panacea:

This is a difficult lesson for schools and districts to learn: the implementation of technology does not magically make education (or edtech, for that matter) happen. Technology is simply a tool. Without a clear purpose, the tool will sit, idle.

The linked article outlines some of the basic questions that schools and districts should answer before pursuing a technology solution. Truncated from the article:

1. What are the ultimate goals for student tech proficiency? In the area of technology, what would a well-educated student from your district know and be able to do with technology by the end of 12th grade?

2. How do the various tech devices and tools used throughout the district lead to the proficiencies described above?

3. What professional development will teachers need to be successful in helping students meet the proficiencies described above?

4. What data should be collected to track the progress of our ed tech initiatives?

The article does not touch upon the cultural changes that may be necessary to take full advantage of technology. A traditional math class with a computer in front of every student will be no more engaging. In fact, technology essentially breaks traditional math classes.

Head over to wolframalpha.com, type in “solve x^2+4x=0” and hit “Enter.” The system tells you the solution right there. X can equal -4 or zero. That’s not much different than having the answers in the back of a math book. That’s why teachers ask students to show their work, to prove that they understand the process.

But, just to the right of the “Results” header is a button that says “Show steps.” When you click that button, every step between the original equation and the solution is displayed with detailed descriptions of the action taken.

And just like that, the rules of traditional math class are broken by technology.

Technology is not a solution; it is a tool that requires a re-imagining of how curricula are delivered and how classroom content is treated.

Gamification provides a structure for that re-imagining that is focused on student engagement, encourages experimentation and exploration, and rewards not the completion of busy work but the mastery of the ideas that we are working so hard to instill in our students.

What if everyone who took the SAT guessed on every multiple-choice question? How many perfect scores would there be?

Fri, 13 Jul 2012 12:03:59 -0400

What if everyone who took the SAT guessed on every multiple-choice question? How many perfect scores would there be?:

The short answer (even after you exclude the written and free-answer portions) is zero. And not just by a little. From the article:

This means that the odds of acing the SAT by guessing are worse than the odds of every living ex-President and every member of the main cast of Firefly all being independently struck by lightning … on the same day.

The full article, with all of the supporting math, is well worth the read. And, while you’re there, don’t miss the answer to, “What would happen if you tried to hit a baseball pitched at 90% the speed of light?” Nothing good, let me tell you!

Let's ask more questions

Fri, 13 Jul 2012 08:50:43 -0400

Let's ask more questions:

From Greg Gorman’s blog:

Sometimes I feel the same in the world of education, when we challenge the past practices and why we do things the way we do them. Questioning some of our practices in the education world is long overdue. Homework, as a practice to improve learning, textbooks as the holy grail of information, and the reluctance to use modern technology to protect our students.

I agree. Let’s ask more questions. Questions are the seeds of open dialog, and dialog is the only way that we will agree to change for the better.

"All knowledge is an experience in interpretation."

Thu, 12 Jul 2012 12:55:15 -0400

“All knowledge is an experience in interpretation.”

- Greg Wilson (via jasonrobertfox)

Schemes of work don't work?

Thu, 12 Jul 2012 08:43:46 -0400

Schemes of work don't work?:

When Mr. Smith and I gamified a 5th grade math curriculum, my ideas included a flipped classroom model. A flipped classroom necessitates change in now lessons and class time are structured. Syded, of http://syded.wordpress.com/, very clearly elucidates one of these obstacles:

There is a problem. It was relatively simple to adhere to a yearly course when delivering content through a variety of mediums. Students could be fairly sure of the lesson structure and the teacher could follow a comfortable pattern. Lesson ideas could be listed and tweaked so existing documents remained relevant. With the iPad and the ‘flipped‘ classroom concept, things aren’t so easy to construct.

This isn’t a bad thing in his mind; teachers and administrators need to adjust their expectations rather than finding a way to add structure to this new delivery method:

The wider implication is that, with content delivery outside the classroom, lessons will be ‘messy’ (with thanks to @jamesmichie). I require the flexibility for lessons to go wrong and not to be too concerned.

Change isn’t easy, but it is possible.

School is too easy

Wed, 11 Jul 2012 14:27:10 -0400

School is too easy:

Yes, school is too easy. The same students who are doing poorly in our K-12 education system think that school isn’t challenging enough.

On the surface, that doesn’t seem to make sense. If kids aren’t doing well in school, why would they want school to be harder?

We are happiest when we are playing at the very edge of our ability. If a game is too easy, people walk away. If a game is too hard, people walk away.

When school is too easy, students disengage. They stop paying attention. They fall behind. And then when they try to catch up later, they’re so far behind that the current level of work is too hard. They disengage again.

The difficulty of course work is a key factor in student engagement. Education technology can make it easier for teachers to offer content of varying levels of difficulty, which would help to maintain student engagement in school. We talked about this before when discussing the gamification of 5th grade math. The idea is well-worth repeating.

"Forget careers. Figure out what you love doing, then pick a college. Careers can wait; you’ll..."

Wed, 11 Jul 2012 13:04:54 -0400

“Forget careers. Figure out what you love doing, then pick a college. Careers can wait; you’ll be happier learning what you love.”

- @veritasf6 in response to @alisucks

We're doing it wrong

Wed, 11 Jul 2012 13:04:00 -0400

I have been spending a lot of time as of late thinking about the connections between students, careers, and college. Many of the education technology solutions out there right now take one of two routes:

Tell students that they need to go to college and focus on getting them in to college;
Tell students that they need to pick a career and then work toward that career.

Take, for example, a recent tweet by a random high-schooler, @alisucks.

literally sitting on my computer on naviance searching possible careers to find out what college i should go to

This is, traditionally, how schools, counselors, parents, and ed tech companies approach the question of “what’s next.” And it doesn’t work.

High school cannot be thought of as independent from college or career. Neither can college or career be treated as individual silos with little to no connection between them. Students, educators, and service providers are not connecting the dots for students in a way they can understand.

First, no high school student should be expected to pick a career. It isn’t possible. High school students do not have enough experience with jobs, or even the world, to begin to intelligently execute that kind of search. Heck, I am 31 years old, have a college degree, a masters degree, and a good amount of work experience under my belt and I still think about what I want to do with my life from time to time.

Second, even if a student could identify the career they wanted to pursue for the rest of their life, is that really the primary criteria they should use when picking colleges?

Third, assuming that the prior two points work out just fine, how does that any of that tie back to a student’s high school experience? This work-flow relegates high school to a hurdle that must be overcome, or a box that must be checked, rather than an experience worth having in-and-of-itself.

Let’s connect these three pieces by taking a step back and looking at this from a higher level. Start by forgetting careers. Students should figure out what they love doing and focus on that. Careers can wait; students will be happier (and more engaged) if they are learning what they love.

Focus on high-level categories. For example, some students like building. They are Builders. Building plays a part of a wide range of careers and courses of study, from the obvious (sculpting, construction) to the less-so (programming, project management, architecture).

If you ask a high school student if they want to be a project manager you’re bound to get a blank stare. They won’t know what a project manager is. They will disengage.

If you ask a student if they want to build things, not only will they understand, they will start to think about how they can learn more about that interest. You increase engagement simply by starting with something that a student can understand.

You can use archetypes like “Builder” to help students explore careers and create a “bucket” of careers rather than pick a specific career. Don’t make a student choose a specific career; let them create a portfolio of possibilities. Let them refine that portfolio throughout the rest of their lives.

These archetypes and buckets of careers are the key to increasing student engagement and drawing connections between high school, college, and a student’s future. With the information contained in this bucket, you can illustrate for students what they need to accomplish in high school and why.

For example, if a student has veterinarian in their career bucket, one of the requirements for high school graduation would be AP Biology. Well, in order to take AP Biology you have to take regular Biology and regular Chemistry. You also need to have a good understanding of math and statistics.

Suddenly math isn’t just something that a student has to take; it is a key component of what they have said they want to do. AP Biology is no longer something that a student is taking so they can get into a top-tier university; AP Biology is giving them the foundation to pursue their dreams.

Another student could look at the science and math requirements and quickly realize that it takes more than a love of animals to become a veterinarian. It could help that student realistically evaluate and adjust their expectations. By removing veterinarian from their bucket of careers, that AP Biology requirement would disappear.

Students could experiment, adding and removing careers, tracking requirement changes and honing in on possibilities that are more in line with their interests.

All of this informs their college discussions and decisions. Our student, instead of taking AP Biology to get into a good college, would look for colleges that would allow her to build on her AP Biology experience as she worked toward her ultimate goal. Students would be able to look for colleges that matched the education requirements of the careers in their buckets.

Students would be going through the college search process with goals in mind, rather than going through the process “because college is next.”

The bucket of careers means that students are never expected to find their “lifetime” career; they are expected to explore. Exploration and experimentation are key pieces of gamification; we can increase student engagement by rebuilding the “career search” process on these cornerstones.

The bucket of careers also gives students stronger base from which to explore colleges. Their options are not limited; they will be looking for colleges that will help them experiment further. Students will focus on learning about what they love rather than hoping they randomly stumble upon something interesting.

All of this is maintained while increasing the relevance of high school in general, and course selection in particular. By drawing clear connections between a student’s bucket of careers and their courses, you help students see that their course work matters. Satisfying work is a key part of why playing games makes people happy. Satisfying work can be a key part of why going to school makes students happy.

Who in their right mind thought that this video would help get...

Tue, 03 Jul 2012 10:55:40 -0400

Who in their right mind thought that this video would help get women interested in the sciences? As the description states, “This is kind of like putting a croissant next to a circuit board in an attempt to get more French people into electrical engineering.”

When people look to flashy lights and stereotypes instead of to proven methods of engagement like gamification I can’t help but…

Let's guide students to live more interesting lives

Tue, 03 Jul 2012 09:28:02 -0400

My favorite fiction author is Neal Stephenson. And while I have enjoyed almost every book he has ever written, one stands out as my hands-down favorite: The Diamond Age, or A Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer.

It is science fiction in the vein of a Dickensian novel, following the life of a street urchin, Nell, who is taken under the wing of various members of the upper crust of society. Nell is also one of three girls, all of different backgrounds and upbringings, who is given a book, the titular Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer. This book, built with nanotechnology, is an interactive and adaptive learning system: the platonic ideal of an individual learning plan and comprehensive curriculum.

The Primer, even in an age of advanced technology, is cutting-edge. More importantly, it was commissioned with a specific goal in mind: intellectually steer its reader toward living a more interesting life.

A more interesting life.

This always stands out to me when I reread The Diamond Age. The thought comes from a grandfather who has seen his own children reach adulthood as well-adjusted and successful individuals, but lacking that je ne sais quoi that separates the good from the great.

It is too late for him to change his children, so he is determined that his granddaughter not receive the same safe, standard education that he provided his children. The Primer is his solution.

We see examples of this grandfather’s concerns and goal everywhere we look today. Look to the innovators. Look to those who have been wildly successful, who have seen the future and dedicated themselves to bring that future to the present. They have not lived normal lives. They have faced hardships. They have taken non-traditional paths. They have done things that no one else has done.

We believe that college is the key to any successful career, but we are surrounded by compelling counter-examples. Steve Jobs dropped out of college. Bill Gates dropped out of college. Mark Zuckerberg dropped out of college.

This isn’t a modern phenomenon. Henry Ford was the son of an Irish immigrant who left the family farm to become an apprentice machinist, guiding his own education before being picked up by Westinghouse for his unique skill set. Thomas Edison was kicked out of school for being “addled” and, for a time, sold candy and newspapers to railway passengers to scrape by.

Needless to say, all five of these individuals went on to leave quite a mark on the world. Stephenson’s book argues that they were able to leave their marks and so totally alter the world in which they lived because of, rather than in spite of, leading interesting and non-traditional lives.

An interesting life can be the difference between good and great.

The Primer is a fully gamified education tool. The story it tells is based in the lore of traditional fables, using well known archetypes (the trickster, the quest, the hero, the wicked step mother) to tell a sweeping tale starring the reader herself. Through her adventures the reader learns everything from the basics (socially: strangers are dangerous; physically: essential survival skills like fire building and map reading) to complex ideas like economic market forces, computer programming, diplomacy, and teamwork.

The Primer exposes the reader to classic literature and integrates their lessons and analysis into her personal journey. There is no math class or science class. There is no physics or chemistry. There is the organic exploration of the natural world in which the reader lives, driven by goals and obstacles presented along her journey.

The Primer is the ultimate individual learning plan (ILP) coupled with an adaptive, comprehensive curriculum. It can be both teacher and parent/mentor, dedicated wholly to the well-being and education of its reader. It adapts to its reader’s abilities, delivering remedial content when necessary, presenting tailored challenges that push the reader to their edge of their ability.

It guides its reader to live a more interesting life, supplementing traditional education with something that is missing from classroom education: adventure.

The technology to build the Primer is that of science fiction. But there is nothing fundamentally insurmountable in the idea. Neil DeGrasse Tyson, famed proponent of space, education, and the sciences, is fond of pointing out that, so long as an idea does not violate the laws of science as we currently understand them, all that stands between it and its realization is hard work and inspiration.

Gamification can help guide students to live more interesting lives. Given the opportunity, I would work to make the Primer a reality.

Who Dares Wins, in the classroom

Tue, 03 Jul 2012 08:37:18 -0400

Who Dares Wins, in the classroom:

This is a great, quick article about adapting game show ideas for the classroom. I remember fondly the class periods dedicated to playing Jeopardy! instead of sitting through traditional lectures.

Who Dares Wins is perhaps even better, as it is a team game that entices a stronger sense of direct competition, helping students play at the edge of their abilities while building a social connection with their team. Very cool.

A brief mention of the flipped classroom

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 14:57:38 -0400

A brief mention of the flipped classroom:

I’ve discussed and even advocated some of the ideas behind a flipped classroom in previous posts. Granted, this article is clearly pushing the MentorMob U product, but it still touches on some of the key concerns while highlighting useful resources, included Khan Academy and TED-Ed.

A Lack Of Rigor Leaves Students 'Adrift' In College : NPR

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 13:12:02 -0400

A Lack Of Rigor Leaves Students 'Adrift' In College : NPR:

jasonrobertfox:

This article presents some interesting studies showing a decline in academic rigor in higher education. It goes on to discuss that students plans for the future and amount of education they need are often misaligned.

One eloquent quote:

Although growing proportions of high school graduates are entering higher education, many are not prepared for college-level work and many others have no clear plan for the future. Most American high schools have come to embrace a “college for all” mentality, encouraging students to proceed to higher education regardless of their academic performance.

Using gamification to reteach movement to stroke victims

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 08:03:54 -0400

Using gamification to reteach movement to stroke victims:

This is an article (and video) about how gamification, and video games themselves, can be used to help patients recover from strokes. From the article:

As Professor Janet Eyre explains in the above video, a game can offer “high motivation with standardized conditions”—a duplicatable set of parameters to challenge a huge population of patients. The games can record player data, not just for progressing through levels, but sharing with doctors—even becoming mathematical projections to answer Eyre’s most basic questions: “Am I making real progress? If I spent more time in the game, would I make more progress?”

That this is a video game is not nearly as important as the aspects of gamification upon which they have built the game. The game provides scalable difficulty, building patients up to more complex motions over time. It gives patients clear, constant, and consistent feedback on their progress. It consists of clear, meaningful goals and actionable next steps. It allows patients to play at the very edge of their ability and recognizes that failure and success are inherently intertwined.

Perhaps most importantly, the game is fun. Patients look forward to therapy. They do the exercises on their own, competing with themselves in the hope of improving. That is the kind of behavior that gamification can bring to the classroom as well.

We must improve education to the point where students are...

Fri, 29 Jun 2012 12:21:20 -0400

We must improve education to the point where students are clamoring to change the world around them.

"The method of assembling and leading teams of individuals with specific talents has seen success in..."

Fri, 29 Jun 2012 11:00:40 -0400

“The method of assembling and leading teams of individuals with specific talents has seen success in corporate and business settings. I wonder if there is a way to adapt it for the classroom.”

- Jamie Smith

Group Dynamics

Fri, 29 Jun 2012 10:56:53 -0400

One of the most popular kinds of video game currently on the market is what is known as an MMORPG – that is, a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game. As the name implies, it involves having hundreds or even thousands of players playing and interacting together on a single game server, playing in a world that exists whether they are logged in or not. They can go through the world singly, or they can go through with others – maybe just a buddy, but often there are areas that require 4, 5, or more players to group together.

The current leader in the MMORPG market is World of Warcraft, which currently has between 10 and 12 million players. It is by far the largest, but there are certainly others – Star Wars: The Old Republic, EVE Online, City of Heroes, and dozens more. Some require a monthly subscription fee, while others are free – though players can spend real money to gain in-game items and benefits.

These details, however, aren’t really pertinent to the ideas I have going around in my head; what interests me is the group dynamic that many of these games use. As the leader in the field, I’ll use World of Warcraft for my examples. In World of Warcraft, one of the features they include are dungeons that, ideally, can only be completed with a group of characters. There are dungeons that require groups of five characters, and then raids – larger dungeons – that require 10 or 25 players at a time.

Not only do these dungeons require groups of players, they also require specific composition of those groups. Each player’s character is a member of a class – a warrior, paladin, rogue, shaman, priest, wizard, and more. Each of these classes can play one (or more) of several roles. Each of these roles plays a part in a group, and if they aren’t all present, and they don’t work together, they are likely to fail.

In World of Warcraft, there are three primary roles and one secondary. The first primary role is commonly referred to as a tank. Characters with this role are expected to be out in front of the group, and it is their job to make sure any monsters the group faces focus their attention on the tank. To this end, the tank typically wears heavy armor or has some other means of acquiring a high degree of protection, and also the ability to force computer opponents to focus their attacks on him. Some tanks work best against single targets, while others are more adept with groups, but however many enemies they face, it is their job to make sure the other members of the group take as little damage as possible. The tank’s role is not to deal damage – just to make sure that he (or she) keeps the monster’s attention.

The next primary role is that of the healer. As the name implies, the healer’s job in the group is to heal. The healer makes sure that any damage the other group members take – often primarily the tank – is healed or prevented, and they also frequently have some means of increasing the abilities of the other group members. The healer has to watch out for the other members of the group, keep a constant eye on how healthy each group member is, and make sure that his healing is not so excessive that it attracts the attention of the monsters the tank is fighting. While the healer will occasionally have time to attack the group’s foes, much of a healer’s attention should always be on his fellow group members.

The third primary role is that of the damage dealer, colloquially known as DPS (damage per second, a measurement of how much damage a character can inflict). For a character in the DPS role, it often seems to be the simplest of the three primary roles – attack often, hit hard, and kill enemies as quickly as possible. While it sounds simple – and, of the three roles, the DPS players generally comprise 3 of the 5 members of a 5-man dungeon group – the role of damage dealer often involves knowing which monsters to hit with which abilities, where to stand to avoid being hit by area attacks, and often having only a certain amount of time in which to do their jobs.

There is a secondary role, one that is often, but not always, included in groups, because it can be done by a player also fulfilling one of the primary roles, and that is the role of crowd controller. A crowd controller’s job, when present, is to control the enemies the group faces. This is different from the tank’s job because a crowd controller, instead of getting enemies to focus on him, instead uses abilities that stun, daze, or disorient opponents, making them unable to attack for some period of time. Many classes have abilities that can do things like this, but it takes a skilled player with good timing to use these abilities to their fullest.

A standard 5-player group will ideally have one tank, one healer, and three DPS players. Without all three roles adequately covered, the group will have little chance of success; without a tank, the other players will take too much damage to survive; without a healer, the damage the players take will be more than they can sustain; and without those in the DPS role, they won’t be able to kill their opponents fast enough.

Working together, this group will have a good chance of success; with one player leading the group – choosing which targets to attack first, and which strategies to use – it will be hard to fail. This is the basic group dynamic of World of Warcraft; for the larger groups, they simply increase the number of players taking each role.

While this method of assembling and leading groups has some success in a more corporate or business-oriented setting, I wonder if there is a way to adapt it for the classroom.

Can school classes be divided up into groups, with each member of a group being given a job to fulfill?

Where each member of the group has to rely on his or her fellow group members to do their job in order to accomplish the greater task at hand?

Can the group dynamic of MMORPGs be made useful for educational purposes?

I’m not sure, but it seems to me like an idea worth looking into.

Photo

Fri, 29 Jun 2012 09:13:09 -0400