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LTEC 5240 Assignment 1 - Reflect on Your Own Understanding


Write a reflection about your experience with games, simulations, or immersive environments as an instructor, a designer, and/or learner. It should be at least 250-300 words. Delve deep. How do you understand the differences between entertainment and learning game design and environments? Why are you interested in learning games?

My parents installed a lot of “educational games” on our family computer when I was growing up.  Like many students of my generation, I played Oregon Trail.  I learned some landmarks I would have never learned, and I became familiar with the name of diseases like dysentery or cholera. I also played more obscure games like the “Super Solver” Learning Company games Such as Spellbound or Midnight Rescue.  I don’t have any proof they helped or hurt my education. I am pretty sure they were better than regular video games. I am not sure if the games were as effective as my parents reading to me, or helping me with homework.
Some of the more advanced games that I have played as an adult have been the Civilization series, Sim City, and most recently a Mars Colony simulator called Surviving Mars.  I remember becoming interested in history because of the Civilization series.  Sim City has taught me about how cities are built. Surviving Mars has deepened my interest in Space Exploration.  There were clear limits to what I could learn in these games, however. No computer simulation can genuinely simulate the unpredictably of the real world.  There is no “save scrumming” in real life, and life is not “balanced” to be fair.
The most “real” simulation I have participated in was a virtual stock market game we played for my high school economics class.  We were given virtual cash to buy “stocks.”  The website we were in tracked the actual stock market, and we got to see our money rise and fall. Because real stock data was used, the lines between the “real world” and the game were blurred.
In the classroom, I used Kahoot and Quizlet with my students. When they first came out, I initially saw a lot of enthusiasm and engagement with the programs. They did become stale after some time leading me to wonder if it was the novelty of them or the games themselves that engaged the students. I believe that gamification in itself does not make a good lesson. A well designed Kahoot game helps students while poorly designed games are a waste of time.  One of the things I look forward to learning in this class is how to plan better.
My experiences with games have shown me that there is a blurry line between what is entertainment and education when it comes to games. It is fun conquering the world in a civilization game, but it is also nice that I can learn about world leaders, and admittedly simplified versions of what society are like. It could be said the education, technology-based or not, does not strictly happen in the classroom. Well-designed instruction must in engage us in multiple levels, and it requires a lot of thought. My interest in video games and my experience as an educator has piqued my interest in learning games. I look forward to continuing this blog.

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