Video Games Assigned as Homework 158
joestump98 writes "I wish that my teacher had assigned video games as homework. Videogame makers are working on making educational games that are playable. The criteria for a good game, not surpising, kids say is an interesting storyline and unique characters."
Possibilities (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Possibilities (Score:1)
Re:Possibilities (Score:1)
Okay, it's not a video game, except inasmuch as you use a monitor, but it'd be good for English class. Amongst others.
Re:Possibilities (Score:1)
Sounds like my prof... (Score:1)
Re:Sounds like my prof... (Score:3, Funny)
1. If 1_0wn2_j00_5Ux0R frags you 5 times, and EatMyFrags frags you 3 times, how many times do you have to frag Noob to keep from being a total lamoid?
Re:Sounds like my prof... (Score:1)
Sure it could, or at least highschool physics.
Your opponent is running across the screen at rate A, X feet away from you, and you are turning at rate B and have a forward velocity of B and upwards velocity of Y and downward acceleration of Q, knowing your rocket launcher fires with a n millisecond latency and the speed of the rocket is Z, at what trajectory do you have to fire your rocket to hit your opponent?
Seems much more complex than the simple ballistics/projectile motion we did in gr.12 physics.
Sociology, folkdancing and now this (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm sure we all recognize the kind of student this will attract: Those unbathed, ill-groomed term-room troglodytes we knew in college, who gave out the terminal room phone number as their own and slowly, lumpishly flunked out.
Some of them stayed on anyway, parasitizing an institution that was no longer willing to tolerate their presence.
Now I guess we won't be flunking them out any more, we'll be giving them A's in "Self-Justification of Incompetence", "Advanced Parasitism", and "Stinking Like a Corpse". I can see it now -- UC Irvine will attract every drug-addled adolescent imbecile in the United States to this "program". Academic standards, already lowerd beyond all human tolerance, will sink beyond all nadirs previously imagined.
They're trying to produce a generation of young Americans so dismally uneducated that they'll fall for any idiotic junk-science and pseudo-philosophy that comes down the pike. A nation of perfect suckers to do as their told, a nation of drones incapable of thinking critically. The "recycling" industry will take off like a rocket (I'll be investing tomorrow, believe me) because these sad excuses for "college graduates" will be incapable of finding out where the "recycling" trucks actually go with the trash that the suckers have carefully sorted through (like bag ladies in their own homes, or slaves assigned as punishment to the garbage heap). Where do those trucks go, you ask? The dump, same as the other trucks. It's just obedience-training. The liberals always do what they're told, because they haven't the imagination or strength of will to create their own freedom.
I'm sorry if I'm ranting here, but I'm watching my nation get flushed down the toilet at the taxpayer's expense, and it's a bit hard to take.
Re:Sociology, folkdancing and now this (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Sociology, folkdancing and now this (Score:1)
Re:Sociology, folkdancing and now this (Score:3, Insightful)
No they didn't. Even if you are referring to dropouts like Bill Gates or David Filo, these guys were always smart. Smarter than the other people around them. They didn't get smart by playing WarCraft and trying to pass it off as a college course.
Incredible! This post is beyond insightful (Score:2)
Its a lovely retort to the huge misconception that all things geeky somehow make you more intelligent (Since they don't make you physcially stronger they must have some value, right?).
Education in North America is at a dismal low. Why is it that every educational contest seems to produce a home-schooled student as the winner? This tells us that a lay-person who actually cares (mom or dad) is capable of producing far better students than our dismal system.
Re:Incredible! This post is beyond insightful (Score:1)
Re:Incredible! This post is beyond insightful (Score:1)
Also lets not just assume the teachers of the home schooled child are necessarily a lay person. Many are unusually intelligent. Hence the decision.
My child (and yes, I have one) will not be taught at school much at school, except the important things I cannot teach.
Like how to get along with other kids. How to pull girls hair. When to accept, and when to challenge. How to be your own person.
These lessons are valuable. I would certainly expect my child to be able to read long before he hits school. Not by forcing him to learn, or by "teaching" him. But by reading with him. Watching Discovery channel with him. Talking about things, answering his questions. That's one of the major roles a parent plays, I feel.
Teaching should not be the job of schools. It should be the job of parents, especially early on.
Re:Incredible! This post is beyond insightful (Score:1)
> training works better than mass class training?
Not surprising at all. The significant difference is not the level of attention the teacher can pay to the student, but rather the fact that a teacher can plan for that student rather than trying to hit either (1) the lowest common denominator or (2) the bestest for the mostest. Individualized educational direction and plans seem to me to be the real benefit of extremely small class sizes (of one or two).
> Also lets not just assume the teachers of the
> home schooled child are necessarily a lay
> person. Many are unusually intelligent. Hence
> the decision.
My experience with home schoolers has been that they are largely ordinary people with singular dedication, concern for their children, and involvement in their lives. They are ur-parents, for whom the PTA is a bunch of ineffective pussies. Brain-wise, I can make no real effective generalization.
> My child (and yes, I have one) will not be
> taught at school much at school, except the
> important things I cannot teach.
> Like how to get along with other kids. How to
> pull girls hair. When to accept, and when to
> challenge. How to be your own person.
(1) I am not sure whether you mean that your child will go to public school or not. Mine will not.
(2) You most definitely will be able to teach your child how to be his own person. What that person turns out to be will be less determinable, but teaching critical thinking, logic, self-reliance, and independence are certainly within the scope of things kids learn from parents.
> These lessons are valuable.
I agree.
>I would certainly expect my child to be able to
> read long before he hits school.
Ditto. Everyone in my family learned to read before kindergarten. I have a vivid recollection of being asked to read an excerpt from the World Book encyclopedia about Columbus on Columbus Day to my class in first grade. I remember stumbling a lot and being extremely self-consciouus about not being able to read very well. I didn't realize that I was being put on display to show the rest of the class, none of whom were readers, that little kids could read.
> Not by forcing him to learn, or by "teaching"
> him.
I've often felt that true "teaching" cannot be "force feeding" -- it is more like being a guide. The absolute best education results from a love or affinity for the subject matter. There are things you must learn which are not enjoyable, but the things you learn the most easily and stick with you the best (other than not to touch hot stoves) are the things that you enjoy.
Learning should also be taught as a process and an end in itself (to an extent) rather than as an obstacle that needs to be overcome. Anyone working in a knowledge business who stops learning these days, at any point, is asking for irrelevance in five years or less. If you are not working in a knowledge business, you are simply betting that you can make a decent living for long enough that your pending irrelevance doesn't cast you into poverty (that sounds sort of biblical in a most anti-biblical manner). Knowledge is power, and that trend is only accelerating.
> But by reading with him.
The most important thing you can do. No question in my mind.
> Watching Discovery channel with him.
Throw out your tv or turn it on only for things you specifically plan to watch. TV is one of the most enormous wastes of life that ever existed. If I had it to do over again, I would, as a kid, have watched Bugs Bunny but I would have passed on pretty much everything else and gone out and played outside. Youth is too precious to waste on TV.
> Talking about things, answering his questions.
> That's one of the major roles a parent plays, I
> feel.
Ditto, except I "think" that instead of "feeling" it. I really hate that phrase: "I feel..." I'm guilty of it as well, but it just strikes me as anti-intellectual and sort of gooey.
> Teaching should not be the job of schools. It
Teaching should be the job of schools. That's what my taxes pay for. I am not paying for daycare. If those kids have to be under lock and key for 6-8 hours, they'd better be learning something other than how to peck an order, fuck, fight, do drugs, and slither through life doing the minimum.
That schools should teach (what an amazing idea!) does not mean that parents should not teach their kids or that kids will obtain most of their education from attending public school. It simply means that the public school (safety net that it is) should be able to provide some sort of basic fundamental education appropriate on some level to each kid that is compelled by law to serve time there.
Bleh.
guac-foo
Re:Sociology, folkdancing and now this (Score:2, Interesting)
It's just obedience-training. The liberals always do what they're told, because they haven't the imagination or strength of will to create their own freedom.
Your rant was at least a little bit valid (despite the completely pointless part about recycling) until you got here. EVERYONE does what they're told. Liberal and conservative alike. If you think it's any different, it's only because your conservative leaders are TELLING you to think that.
Open your eyes, man. You bitch that it's "them" that's screwing up the system. It's always "them". Until people realize that it's ALL OF US, TOGETHER, screwing things up, it ain't gonna get any better.
You obviously like to complain, but do you ever do anything about it? I doubt it. (And, no, I don't either, but I accept the fact that it's my OWN DAMN FAULT and don't try to blame other people)
--Jeremy
The System (Score:1)
Re:Sociology, folkdancing and now this (Score:1)
ask yourself for a moment who told them to do it(the civil rights movement), and who benefitted from it, and you'll see my point
gee... my guess would be... all the people who weren't allowed to use a freaking PUBLIC BATHROOM because of the color of their skin
Yes, Lincoln was a conservative Republican; the liberal Democrats, the party of treason as always, were the party of the slave-owning South.
Except that before the Civil War the Democratic party was sharply divided between north and south. The Northern Democrats took control of the party during the war (because there were no southerners in either party at the time), and maintained that control thereafter, thus resulting in an essentially completely different party.
Is Sony "Sponsoring" schools ? (Score:1)
Re:Is Sony "Sponsoring" schools ? (Score:1)
It's just a trick... (Score:2, Funny)
He're the only game I know of that might qualify.. (Score:1)
Medieval: Total War [techtv.com]
My sister will soon be a history teacher in rural Illinois. She is a gamer, and would gladly assign the right game as homework. There are equal access issues to consider, however. If the school doesn't have a nice big computer lab, you've just assigned homework that only the relatively rich kids can do.
Re:He're the only game I know of that might qualif (Score:2)
But "Balance of Power", the
And
Re:He're the only game I know of that might qualif (Score:1)
Of course, it doesn't have the epic battles of Medieval, with thousands of warriors ready to obey your commands (or not), which is what makes M:TW great.
Europa Universalis II and Medieval: Total War. Two fantastic games.
Re:He're the only game I know of that might qualif (Score:1)
I already knew about morale, military maneuvers, etc. before playing Shogun, but that was the first game I ever played which really tried to emulate them. Flank attacks out of forests, double envelopments, charging cavalry down a hill, even just psyching out the enemy's conscripts, all worked just like in the history books... That game did a great job.
I know you're not a gamer, but try to hunt down a copy of Shogun. You'll probably like it more than Medieval.
FWIW, I wanted a Shogun sequel in the same time period, but in Europe. Imagine a Gustavus Adolphus campaign like those in Shogun, or the Thirty Years' War fought with a Shogun-like engine, only in Germany...
Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego... (Score:1)
The only thing that could possibly be gained is to generate some sort of interest in geography in the player...and to encourage them to read some actual books about it. Failed for me, but that's about the only area I can see this being useful.
Re:Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego... (Score:5, Funny)
Playing or writing? (Score:1)
Re:Playing or writing? (Score:1)
However, my University is heavily Windows orientated, aside from a Linux lab the computing students have and some Macs in the art department.
In my 3rd year, I'll be coding a large project which will offer me platform choice. In the meantime it'd be useful to know how you got around the problem of demonstrating your apps/code when the tutor used a specific IDE and taught according to that IDE? (if that problem appeared for you)
First look: BAH! On closer inspection, however... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd even go so far as to say that it can replace a major chunk of "homework" for these kids. Even better, it seems to eat up time normally occupied by traditional video gameplay, which is basically useless (other than purely mindless entertainment). All-in-all, sounds like a good thing.
My sole complaint here is this: the more we try to package learning as entertainment, the less we seem to emphasize that learning for its own sake is fun and interesting. And we also seem to be reinforcing the concept that it has to be FUN in order to be worth doing. Sadly, the world doesn't opperate this way, and I think we're doing a great disservice to kids if we get them thinking that learning has to be somehow immediately entertaining.
I realize this is for younger kids, where we don't have this problem so much, but I want to make sure that at some point, we start reinforcing the notion that learning for knowledge (and problem solving) are their own rewards, and don't have to be wrapped up in some entertainment package to be worth doing.
-Erik
Re:First look: BAH! On closer inspection, however. (Score:2)
Re:First look: BAH! On closer inspection, however. (Score:2)
I don't even want calculaters in the class room until grade 8, much less video games. My kids go to school to LEARN, not to be entertained. I don't want them to be misreable of course, but learning without video eye candy should be stimulating and interesting all on its own. Any teacher that is considering video games as an education aid should stop and reavaluate how they are teaching.
I did try out a couple of "education" games with my kids at home. The kids thought they were ok games, but they didn't stick at them long enough to improve any math or reading skills. I had much better success with flash-cards and reading together. The kids like the one on one time, and the much more flexible and intuitive 'DAD' interface. That's right - I can much more quickly answer the kids questions and adjust to the pace they are learning at than any video game. I can handle changing subjects if something we reads brings up a question about atronomy or history.
So put away the games and spend some time reading with your kids, helping with the home work, doing flash cards (my daughter actually has a favorite question that I have to keep re-insterting into the deck over and over until its last question).
Don't become a parent unless you want to spend a lot of time being a parent. The TV is not a baby-siter, the computer is not a teacher.
Really cool if you think about it this way (Score:1)
Pretty clever really. Thinking back, I wrote all my high school essays on an Atari with 512k and a decent word processor, I think the whole thing may have booted/run software off a 3.5" floppy and an internal ROM. Didn't have a spell checker or anything but considering I was writing for highschool I think spell checkers may have been a bad idea at the time.
As far as the 'edutainment' gripe is concerned, how about having a seemingly meaningless code output at the end - similar to the old NES games continuation codes. Student writes it down and gives it to teacher, teacher uses conversion program to find out that the student has missed 65% of the questions, mostly the hard ones.
What would be really, really cool is if there could be a way of hacking together a cheap solution for the output problem. Student has CD with Linux port - exists for PS1 if I recall - some mini gui and a small office solution. Student writes essay. Are they SOL if they want to say print/email the text to teacher? Is there an obvious output solution I'm unaware of? I can think of that wouldn't at least triple the cost of the system.
Re:First look: BAH! On closer inspection, however. (Score:1)
My sole complaint here is this: the more we try to package learning as entertainment, the less we seem to emphasize that learning for its own sake is fun and interesting. And we also seem to be reinforcing the concept that it has to be FUN in order to be worth doing. Sadly, the world doesn't opperate this way, and I think we're doing a great disservice to kids if we get them thinking that learning has to be somehow immediately entertaining.
I don't really agree that it's a disservice to kids to connect learning to immediate entertainment. On the contrary, I think this is a useful thing to reinforce, as it makes learning a pleasurable activity.
I don't think that kids should expect that Lightspan will necessarily do a game for everything they should learn. However, via concepts such as Mind Maps [mind-map.com], immediate entertainment (and the association of it with "all learning") becomes a Good Thing.
I challenge that assertation. (Score:2)
Maybe you haven't sat down and observed people who've played a lot of video games vs. people who haven't.
When you're gaming, you're right in the action! You have to keep everything in your mind, solve puzzles, memorize things quickly, watch for key frames to strike on, and more! It brings many skills into play, not the least of which is learning and memorization. You can always spot habitual gamers because they only have to go somewhere once to have memorized the route (this is especially noticable in people who play FPSes competitively enough that a path to a weapon from any point on the map is the difference between winning or losing). They're also quick to pick up on things, like how to operate a particular program (if they're good gamers), because they will explore the interface the way they'd explore a dungeon. Games also introduce new skills in an easy form that people can absorb at their own rate (like the car maintenance sense and knowledge of how upgrades/repairs work in general in Sega GT, or the communication and socialization habits in Animal Crossing).
Gamers of the sort I mention tend to be more alert, have quicker response times, and have an active imagination. Exactly the kind of people I'd like the world to have more of.
(Note: that paragraph is part of an article about the costs of entertainment, comparing music, DVDs, and video games for the gaming section of my website).
A good game is WHAT? (Score:4, Insightful)
I thought the criteria for a good game was fun gameplay. Storyline and Character Development have their places in game making, but shouldn't be of primary concern unless the game is story-centric. A great storyline is not going to save a game if its not fun. A great game can still be fun with a craptastic or non-existent storyline (Tetris).
If you want great graphics, watch a movie or animation. If you want a great story, read a book. If you want to have fun, play a game. Chris Crawford (Atari and GDC founder), one of the original game developers, discussed this several times with me. I now keep that in mind every time I consider adding a new feature to one of my games. I've never heard of players refusing to play a fun game because the story sucks; so who cares if my game worlds and characters aren't comprable to Fiction writers?
Re:A good game is WHAT? (Score:3, Informative)
Hmm, this is where we differ. Why can't you have all of these in a game? Final Fantasy (when it first came out) combined all of these, anbd there are others through the years that do as well. Games these days just seem to suck. Are all the original ideas gone? I'd like to think not, but then again, I'm just a cusumer
Re:A good game is WHAT? (Score:2)
2) Detailed stories are much harder to combine with flexibility and a truly responsive world instead of one with a fixed, linear story arc.
Re:A good game is WHAT? (Score:1)
You can have a good storyline in a game without ruining the gameplay. If the development team is weighting the storyline as an equal to gameplay, its very likely that the game is going to suck. Final Fantasy is a very story driven game, and thus is acceptible for them to allocate a large amount of resources to story and character development. This comes at a price, because they forgot that people are playing the game and not reading a story. For example Final Fantasy's interface is horribly slow, which is completely unacceptble. A large portion of the game is spent wading through text that is scrolled. Why can't it appear instantly? There is no gain by having scrolling, whatsoever. This forces speed readers to spend large chunks of time waiting, which is the greatest no-no in games. If they just allocated 1 full time guy to making a more functional interface than artistic, the game(s) would have been more enjoyable.
Games these days just seem to suck. Are all the original ideas gone? I'd like to think not, but then again, I'm just a cusumer
Personally, I think originality is overrated. Why does it matter if its been done before if its still fun. Originality is a bonus that will make your game more enjoyable for the first few hours of the game. After that your game is going to be redundant in some way, and so will your game's biggest selling point if you bet the farm just on uniqueness. Look at some of the most popular games sold this year. Grand Theft Auto: 3, Warcraft III, Both Medal of Honors. They're all sequels! Each of these games are not original compared to their predecessors, yet successful. They found a formula that works, and tried to make it again with better graphics, story, and most importantly gameplay.
I'm not saying that you should just scrap plot and storyline. It adds a lot to a game if done right (unintrusive...). No matter what you have in your game, its just not worth playing if its not fun. Make the game fun, and then you can worry about your storyline. If you don't, noone will care about your story because nobody is playing your game.
Re:A good game is WHAT? (Score:1)
IMHO, that Stuntman game for PS2 is kinda original. Even though it was based on plain 'ol driving elements of racing games, the concept of being an employed stuntman is a decent idea. One of the coolest things is that they explain how some stunt type things are done in movies (i.e. American stunt drivers that have to drive right-hand cars actually drive a tiny, unseen wheel on the left side while a person on the right pretends to drive the other wheel. Whee!).
Sadly, can't think of any others off the top of my head...
Re:A good game is WHAT? (Score:1)
And I love Final Fantasy... but after playing Kingdom Hearts yesterday, I really think Square should consider making a platformer ^_^
(OT) Kingdom Hearts? I got you babe... NOT! (Score:1)
after playing Kingdom Hearts yesterday
Unfortunately, I won't be able to enjoy Kingdom Hearts because 1. the PS2 is still too expensive, and 2. I'm boycotting the instigators of the Bono Act [everything2.com].
Re:A good game is WHAT? (Score:3, Insightful)
As far as original games go, the real problem is that consumers can be picky. Ico was a pretty good game but it wasn't a sales demon. If I took a standard game genre and turned the plot into a tree structure, you stand a good chance of alienating players. Even if its only a binary split, the number of events per play through is going to be hurt. Even a 4 level path takes up 15 levels worth of data. 15 levels/missions is a lot to make, but 4 isn't many to play. So while there's many possibilities, knowing which ones the unwashed masses will enjoy is difficult. Shiney brought many fresh ideas to the market but they lack the stability now they once had.
Quake 3 vs. Wolf3d (Score:2)
What has Square (And almost every other producer of Not-Roleplaying Games) done all these years
They published Tobal and Ehrgeiz, two 3D fighting games with 60fps graphics (impressive on PS1) and the freedom of motion of a wrestling game (up moves away from screen, down moves toward screen).
Shooting someone in Quake 3 is really no different than shooting someone in Wolfenstein 3-D
Wolf3d, with sideways movement buttons overlayed with its turning buttons, didn't stress moving sideways to avoid fire. Wolf3d, with its single-plane level design, didn't stress taking strategic positions. Wolf3d, with its hundreds of drones and then a tank game design, didn't stress AI. Heck, Wolf3d didn't even have a deathmatch, and Quake III is ALL deathmatch.
Combine it all. Give me a world where I can command a fleet from my chair, or go out with a rifle and frag enemies of the Imperium.
The America's Army series does this. There's an RTS version and an FPS version.
Re:A good game is WHAT? (Score:1)
Re:A good game is WHAT? (Score:1)
Homework Assignment. (Score:4, Interesting)
Problem 1:
Load Quake3. Examine some of the textures along the walls. Point out whether or not maps in dm1 use:
Problem 2
Load Warcraft 3. Notice the design of some of the landscape. What would be the most effective use of storage for generating map material (e.g the landscape). Exclude objects such as trees since they are objects within the level. Explain why in your reasoning.
Write a program that takes a 100x100 array of height points, and a 100x100 grid of bezier height points, and write a program that creates a 200x200 array of height points. Remember to generate ALL height values.
Part 2: Try tesselating further into a 400x400 array.
Part 3: Render this into the API of your choice (OpenGL, Direct3d). Create a program that tesselates the grid runtime based on the distance to each key point on the grid. Derive your own reasonable equations to determine this.
Extra Credit: You'll notice some "popping" as new vertices are generated. This is because as new vertices are created between height points, the old ones are shifted over. Write a routine based on the previous problem that forms new vertices along the old position, and then morphs to the new position.
Re:Homework Assignment. (Score:2)
Educational games (Score:2, Interesting)
Some games are educational without trying... (Score:2)
And then there was always oregon trail - quite a fun game, I think. That taught a lot about...the Oregon Trail - the wildlife, what had to happen, etc.
I don't think that as many people would know how a rail-gun works without FPS (although I'm not sure most people know what they actually look like).
Social Interaction (Score:3, Funny)
Boy didn't it hurt when you tried out the ol' "Kiss" command on a random girl in the schoolyard (:
Heh, reminds me of Oregon trail (Score:4, Interesting)
The best thing about Oregon Trail from a teacher's viewpoint is it taught us basically without supervision, we learned to work as a team (had to double-up on the machines), taught us what it was like for them back then, and made me a deadly shot when we needed venison.
Were they as good as the games people have today to play? Yes, IMO, because it was new and exciting, and all the ideas weren't already out there and repeated 50 times.
Re:So you were the 1 kid 'learning' from Oregon Tr (Score:1)
shhh. Of course that's what I did. Never know when that old teacher might be watching.
I did (Score:2)
Benefits of being an arts graduate
finally (Score:1, Interesting)
I've always thought (well before i knew how to program) that good video games were true pieces of art, to be appreciated with much respect. For those that still don't play them: as much respect as a painting. I'm sure that because u're reading this here on slashdot, you've played a video game before, the odds that u have are far higher if u were a kid in the last 20 yers. But, notice, that there are lots of people that choose (for whatever reason) just not to have technology like this in their lives. This tends to cause a lot of tension between them and their children. I think its interesting how some people are just never going to interact with tech, no matter how much its at their fingertips.
Video Games Definately Help (Score:1)
On a related note (moderation note: of recreational activities not usually tied with education, but, nonetheless, contributing to it), a fundamental rule for speaking well in English, that being to never end a sentance with a preposition, I learned from, and continually refer back to, Beavis and Butthead Do America.
Edutainment.... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Edutainment.... (Score:1)
I don't think educational games are necessary or even useful teaching tools.
Though some learning is fun, a lot of the learning process is work. I think kids should be disciplined to get used to the work part so it doesn't seem like such an effort to *gasp* go to the library and read books and articles.
How do you think the people who write these games learn the material?? Cut out the middle man and read the books yourself.
-Kevin
Video Games and Brainwaves (Score:2)
Re:Video Games and Brainwaves (Score:1)
-Kevin
Re:Video Games and Brainwaves (Score:2)
Re:Video Games and Brainwaves (Score:1)
Interesting storylines not needed. (Score:5, Insightful)
What BS.. one of the most popular games at the moment is Dance Dance Revolution which has no storyline, and the characters are overdone anime types who are there for no reason at all.
A lot of kids are getting fit from playing Dance Dance Revolution, and even a school in Los Angeles bought a DDR machine for Phys Ed class. [cbsnews.com]
Okay, it's not educational, but it's in a school, and the kids love it.
Games do not necessarily need storylines (see almost any multiplayer game) to keep interest. They just need to be addictive. For example, Tetris, DDR, Tetrinet, SimCity.
Talking of which.. anyone remember Sierra's 'Castle of Doctor Brain'? Great educational game, and I even played it a few months ago to bring back the memories!
Re:Interesting storylines not needed. (Score:1)
CIV (Score:1)
I'd be really interested to see an article posted that interviews every single one of the students in that class regarding their opinion of the games. Then see if you still get the impression that these games are still as wondeful as this article says. I mean, all the evidence they present here is an interview with 1 student/family and a bunch of people who are either making or deploying the game.
Cheesy game music (Score:1)
Queue RIAA...
What's the matter with kids today (Score:2)
What?!? I thought it was l33t gr4ph1X that you can turn off to get 120fps. And railgun jumping.
Kids these days.
Erik
This reminds me of two things... (Score:3, Insightful)
2) Doing a science fair project back in middle school on video games and hand-eye coordination. The project won first place and went to county, where it won second place.
I'm all for more gaming in the classroom, as games can teach basic skills like critical thinking and logic.
School==School; Play==Play; (Score:2, Insightful)
What a poor proposition in general. Sure, players do "learn" while playing, in terms of improving their game-playing skills. They also remember details reinforced through multiple plays. However, video games present an environment too distracting for educational purposes. The already overstimulated kids would be receiving multiple aural and visual inputs from the game, applying some cognitive decision-making, then producing outputs on the game controller. Since this would ostensibly be done in a game-playing environment, there would probably be other distractions as well. Human Factors research shows that cognitive performance decreases rapidly with the number of inputs, the number of input modalities (aural/visual/etc...), and the complexity of the outputs. In short, you can not expect to really learn while playing a video game.
I agree with a previous poster that video games should only be assigned as homework for courses in Computer Graphics.
The quality of education in this country has become abyssmal. People 10 years younger than I have to reach for a calculator to multiply two two-digit numbers or to compute a 20% tip (double the bill, move the decimal one tick to the left). The average incoming freshman at my uni had a high school GPA of 3.7 or higher, but the research papers written by them--even as sophomores and juniors--would have earned me a "C" back in 6th grade. Have any of you "older" (30-40 y.o.) readers seen a contemporary textbook? They resemble USA Today with slick, meaningless graphics, horribly slanted and inaccurate "facts", and so little depth. Kids today are already being crippled by their shoddy education. Don't cripple them by expecting them to learn from video games.
I love this line (Score:1)
Tech Support = Kids.
Assignment monitor = Kids.
No forging notes from parents to teachers, it will be the other way around;
"Dear Mr(s)Horshack,
Due to budget cutbacks, we are unable to provide Horshack with his latest "chapter" in social studies.
We would appreciate it if you could purchase "Frag'em to Hell" so he may continue this valuable portion of his education.
Thank You,
signed, Horshack's Teacher"
GTA3? (Score:3, Funny)
Economics 101:
Now notice, that when you crack a brotha' in the head with a bat, he drops his money. Now, other people will rush up to see what's up to see what's goin' down, and then you can clock all of those suckas, too.
Law 101:
When you have to steal a cop car, keep in mind that the doors are all locked. So, try to open the passenger side. When the punk ass bitch gets out to try to git ya', he unlocks all of his doors! So then slide in the passenger side, and take off while that fool is still runnin' around to the other side of the car!
Sociology 101:
Be careful when you're in a gang controlled 'hood. Taking one connected guy's car id gonna make all of his brotha's try to gat yo ass.
Foreign language:
After you piss off the Italians, NEVER go back into their neighborhood. They be gunnin' for ya with sawed-offs that can take out ANY vehice.
Driver's Ed:
Do your best to get a tank. Nobody casn stop yo ass in a tank. Those motherfucka's be solid!
One possibility... (Score:2, Interesting)
Once I've actually got their network sorted out, I plan on writing a 2D platform game where they earn time in the game by solving Math problems, and where the problems that require more thought are rewarded with more time (so, for example, solving a few simple multiplication/division sums might get them thirty seconds, whereas solving a trig problem might get them five minutes). The whole thing will be completely voluntary, the prospect of shooting bunnies will hopefully be enough to spare them on a little, and they'll be spending their time doing something a little more worthwhile than clicking on pretty pictures (which seems to be the theme of a lot of so called "educational" proprietary software out there right now).
The only problem is that unless they find someone else to do the library shifts every lunchtime then I'll have probably moved on to another job before I've had chance to sort their IT out and write the game. But then my attempts to get this through to management will probably only surface when they're asking why I left...
--
Andrew
stupidity at its highest (Score:2, Interesting)
The entire educational system is in the crapper as far as i'm concerned. The larger problem is that we have teachers that don't give a darn about teaching and students who would rather be doing something else. Albiet that the latter has almost always been true, i mean, when did a kid *want* to go to school? I know many who do and the only reason is that from birth their parents have told them that to get somewhere in this world, they must go to school. Teachers, on the other hand, get paid less and less. That is the crux of the problem. I don't know many teachers who wouldn't bail for another job. The third issue is the idea in the American psychology that the school should teach everything from math to table manners to ethics (in other words: the school should be parenting). The fourth issue is our governments desire to fund murderous foreign goverments (read: Israel and a hundred others) with billions of dollars that could be going to our schools. All of this thrown together and we end up with teachers experimenting with tomorrows youth by playing video games. Did the generations of the 18 and 19 hundreds that got the ball rolling to have the technology we have today rely on a playstation? No, they relied on a pencil and a stack of paper. That is the only way to learn basic skills. That is way it should be. No video games in this household.
narrative possibilities (Score:1)
http://dvtg.hku.nl
Class assignment (Score:2)
Civilization ... (Score:2)
I'm kinda surprised that no one has mentioned that yet ...
Just a little plug for FreeCiv [freeciv.org]
While this is cool... (Score:1)
Since when did DDR have a story?
Since when was Marvel Vs Capcom2's characters original?( granted, given that MvC2 is a huge money maker at arcades and home alike, it must be doing something right... )
they THINK they're learning... (Score:1)
"The kids love it. They're interested in it, and if you can get students where they think they're learning and they're playing, it has hit the magic mark," said Joy Davis, assistant principal at Summerour Middle School in Norcross, Georgia.
Freudian slip? Government conspiracy?
You decide.
back in the day (Score:2)
Back in the stone ages when I was a kid, the only way we were assigned video games was as a programming assignment for our Assembler class! And not just any old ASM, but it would hours of dealing with that segmented 80n86 crap just to eek out an MS-DOS version of pong!
And it was uphill both ways with holes in our shoes!
What about *higher* education? (Score:1)
Is this REALLY necessary? (Score:1)
So Can I take... (Score:1)
3y3 0wn3rz j00 0r3g0n tr41l!! ph34r my m4d v3n1son hunting sk1llz!
kids are idiots (Score:2, Insightful)
What we need are UNIQUE STORYLINES and INTERESTING CHARACTERS, not the other way around.
Most characters are either a serious cliche knockoff (Max Payne) or are unique but completely uninteresting and lack personality.
Most storylines are cliche "save the world" rehashing to the extreme. They do need to be interesting, but the first step to making it interesting is to actually try to make it unique in the first place.
And most gamers care more about SOLID and NOT ANNOYING gameplay and control. Counter-Strike's graphics are seriously outdated, it has templated characters, and no storyline, and it has no storyline, but it's popular because of it's rock-solid gameplay.
Rant over.
The Glass Menagerie (Score:2)
when I was a kid... (Score:1)
Sierra!! (Score:1)
It's a shame they stopped making games like the King's Quest/Space Quest series (I mean before they dummed it down and went with the icon interface).
I have had video games assigned as homework... (Score:2)
It was an interesting course, not only in the subject matter but also that it drove home that where literature is classically just the written word, it's important to look at other forms of media when you're trying to get a view of how things are portrayed.
SimCity used as homework (Score:1)
Interface studying (Score:1)
IDRTA (I didn't read the article), but for comparative interface studies getting video game assignments can be a good thing. Other posters' bad-mouthing other things like language programs and such are almost right - the computer could be an excellent way to teach/learn many things including languages.
Most things just haven't been done right, though.
This is utterly cheesy. (Score:1)
Re:I happen to know a guy... (Score:4, Funny)
Be afraid.
Re:I happen to know a guy... (Score:1)
Re:You posted 2 weeks ago that he was dead at 54 (Score:1)
Re:Stephen King, author, dead at 55 (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Here's a mirror (Score:1)
Re:Reintroduce text-based Sierra games (Score:1)
Re:Blah (Score:1)
I personally learnt much as a child by playing Carmen Sandiego games. How many seven-year-olds do you know that know where Sofia is (I'm in Australia, so nobody here has any reason to know or care)? It's probably useless knowledge, but at least I learnt a s#!tload.
Re:I'm sorry, but playing games is not "study". (Score:2)
Re:I'm sorry, but playing games is not "study". (Score:1)
I'm not claiming that there are any videogames that are textbooks. I am claiming that there should be, could be and one day, most probably one day soon, will be.
I find it hard to believe that no-one in this thread has referenced Henry Jenkins and his games to teach project [mit.edu].
Re:finally someone has some balls (Score:1)