We can be Heroes –
just for one day
David Bowie
Computer games and learning has become an important topic in research during the last
few years, and the use of computer games for learning in schools is increasing. Having
said that, there is also a tendency in public and academic discourse to treat games as beneficial
for learning in their own right. In our view, there is also a need to study how games
are introduced into institutional settings, including how they can be integrated with, or
used for changing, schools’ assessment practices and teachers’ orchestration and support
of students’ learning.
Recently the European Schoolnet presented a study of teacher’s use of computer
games. The study showed that teachers reported great interest and enthusiasm for using
games in their teaching. According to the study, the use of games often implies a multidisciplinary
approach to knowledge that requires students to be active and to show a wide
range of skills. Language lessons (both 1st and 2nd languages) are the subjects where
games are used most often. History, geography and maths are also often mentioned. In
addition, games are more often used to develop teamwork and intellectual skills. Teachers
use educational games, but also, and perhaps more often than might be suspected, they
use commercial and leisure games. The study was divided into several parts: a review of
research, a survey of teachers, case studies, interviews with educational decision-makers,
and a community of practice on the Internet (European Schoolnet, 2009).
ITU has during the last few years tried several games for learning, and is currently
conducting a pilot study at Sandvika Upper Secondary School with the urban planning
game Urban Science – one of David Shaffer’s epistemic games.
In epistemic games, players learn to think about real problems by doing in game form what
professionals in the real world do to learn innovative and creative thinking – the kind of thinking
that young people need in the digital age of global competition (Shaffer, 2007, s. 68)
According to Shaffer, epistemic games provide ways of helping students learn to think like
professionals. The concept is based on the idea of "epistemic frames"— a way of thinking
and working of a profession or other community of practice. It entails a situated and action-
based form of learning based on the ways in which professionals develop these epistemic
frames. Epistemic games are also about a particular way of working and engaging
with knowledge.
Epistemic games seem to offer realistic environments for creating things, solving
problems closely related to real-life work challenges and for curriculum issues. They aim
to develop competence among students that more easily transfers to workplace settings
and that facilitates the development of students’ deeper understanding of important disciplinary
domains.
In the Nordic countries, collaborative project work has been an important part of
children’s education for many decades. The National Curriculum also encourages teachers
to engage students in project work where students usually examine some loosely defined
problem often from multi-disciplinary perspectives. Serious games and epistemic
games represent some interesting approaches on the further development of such learning
environments. In these games students often work in groups and engage in solving
complex and ill-defined problems through actual activities – such as building a house or
designing a city. This might be a way of establishing learning environments that students
find motivating, that develop students’ competence, that more easily transfer to workplace
settings and that facilitate the development of students’ deeper understanding of
important disciplinary domains.
The crucial significance of contextualising and creating joint goals for learning also
became obvious when we explored how the computer game ‘Global Conflicts: Palestine’
served as a learning resource for understanding complexity in the Palestine-Israel conflict
at Stovner Upper Secondary School in Oslo. Students played freelance journalists covering
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
It became obvious that one of the challenges when introducing the game’s working
method in schools, was that learning outcomes did not always correlate with students
opinion of what knowledge is. For example, in one of the group discussions after playing
the game, some students said they did not learn anything from playing the game, that in
some way the opposite happened: it actually became harder to maintain their strong
opinions from the earlier discussions. At first, the students did not consider this learning,
but this sense of confusion in many ways correlates with the game’s learning objective: to
show the complexity of the conflict.
In a good computer game – typically for leisure use – the player is always confronted
with issues and challenges in “real” situations, and the skills and knowledge that the player
needs are developed through solving them. Help and support for this are found in the
game environment, in various tools available to the player and from other players. Computer
gamers are very good at sharing knowledge and experience with each other on
various websites. In school it is the opposite. Problems and exercises are rarely related to
real-life. Rather, students solve routine maths problems or memorise English vocabulary
for no other purpose than mastering the skill. We are not saying that rote learning or automation
of skills has no place in school. Even computer games are full of tedious and repetitive
exercises. However, this must relate to some higher purpose that provides students
with meaning and motivation.
Prejudice against commercial computer games and young people’s use of computers
in their spare time is often the cause of scepticism to computer gaming in schools. Naturally,
there’s reason for concern when young people are up all night playing computer
games, but in the shadow of the media’s one-sided focus on gaming addiction and negative
aspects of computer games, there are important aspects not adequately discussed:
What is so appealing about these games? Obviously, computer games have a strong potential
for providing insight, presenting simulated realities and encouraging cooperation.
Could it be that young people’s fascination with computer games is derived from the
games’ structures being good learning environments? Could such games have a potential
for learning and teaching? Consequently, the need for empirical research of computer
games in schools, as well as defining what counts as learning outcomes, is crucial.
Morten Søby, Hans christian arnseth
editors
References
European Schoolnet (2009). How are digital games used in schools? Downloaded 26.06.2009 from: http://games.eun.org/ upload/gis-synthesis_report_en.pdf
David W. Shaffer (2007) How Computer Games Help Children Learn. New York,
N.Y. Basingstoke : Palgrave Macmillan DK-2009-1.book Page 3 Wednesday, July 1, 2009 9:29 AM
