Spotlight on Digital Media And Learning

2.11.10 | Steve Hargadon posted a great interview with Jim Gee last week. Gee, author of “What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy,” and a professor of literary studies at Arizona State University talks with Hargadon and co-host Ed Hill about how games can help make classroom content feel more relevant and meaningful to students.

Games, Gee says, can help kids apply content knowledge to help solve real world problems that capture their interests and passions.

When trying to integrate games into their classroom, many of today’s educators, Gee says, make the mistake of focusing on content instead of on the actual game play.

“Content is learned through problem solving,” Gee says, “not by fronting content itself.”

Gee gives an example of a young woman who failed geometry class and is now a top designer in Second Life, where she uses algebra and geometry to build with the software’s 3-D engines. She learned that geometry is a tool that could help her to achieve something she is passionate about.

Listen to the full podcast here.

Plus: WICN Radio’s Inquiry interviewed Mizuko Ito, researcher at University of California, Irvine, who also talked about games and learning last week.

Ito’s recent book, “Engineering Play: Cultural History of Children’s Software,” examines the evolution of children’s software. Today’s games, she argues, are exciting because they offer kids the opportunity to really engage in “self-directed learning.” Games like “Sim City” that are open-ended allow kids to develop their own interests.

However, Ito, a cultural anthropologist, argues that adults need to pay attention to the context in which kids are playing the game and help set up an environment that “channels productive use and inquiry.”

Ito says that games need to be played in a social environment where kids are learning from each other and learning from more experienced peers and adults. These relationships can help model and guide kids imaginations in these spaces.

Listen to the full interview here.