Interactive Gaming and the Teaching of History, Civics & Social Studies

Interactive Gaming and the Teaching of History, Civics & Social Studies Mike Clare Sessional Instructor Faculty of Education michael.clare@uoit.ca

Boy uses gaming skills to save sisterBy QMI Agency If anyone's ever told Hans Jorgen Olsen that video games are a waste of time, they'll have to eat their words. Olsen, 12, saved his sister from a moose using the knowledge he gained playing World of Warcraft, reports the Norwegian online newspaper Nettavisen. The pair were walking through the woods in the central Norwegian town of Leksvik when they came face-to-face with an angry moose. Olsen knew what he had to do, thanks to the countless hours spent playing WOW, a multi-player online role-playing game. First, he taunted the animal to get it away from his sister. In WOW, players use taunting to get monsters off their less well-armed team members. Then, when the beast came after him, he played dead. "When you reach level 30, you learn a trick called the fake death. That's what I did - I pretended I was dead, and then the moose lost interest," he said. "It went really well.” http://technology.canoe.ca/2010/06/01/14210871.html

Common Games Farmville The Sims GranTurismo Counter Strike Starcraft

Not so common Trainyard Express Minecraft Spy Party Passage Sword & Sworecry

Fun vs. Learning Games are all about rewards & fun

Brain Learning Theory Experiential Learning, Situated Learning Engagement Teachers More engaged in art & tech classes Math & science classes History & social sciences at the bottom Students are more engaged writing a test than watching a movie Level of relevance or interest to the students Level of interaction Level of concentration required Relates to theories of Flow but it is not time on task, a low level of engagement

Engagement Transformed Challenged Actively Participating Interested On task TC2 Taxonomy of Engagement

Games http://www.museedelaguerre.ca/cwm/games/armwar/enhance/home_frame_e.html How is it playful? Armoured Warrior Who is the audience? Hunt The Ancestors http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/trail/archaeology/overview/act_hunt_ancestors_entry.shtml

Games What is the victory condition? What is the game genre? Homelessness Is No Game http://wetcoastgames.ca/homeless/homeless.swf

Games What is the viewpoint? (e.g. what do the players see? Top down perspectives, over the shoulder, over the shoulder, first person?) What do the players control? (e.g. single character like Mario Bros, A set of resources like SIM City? Or pieces of a system, Tetris) http://www.newsgaming.com/games/index12.htm Sept 12 Third World Farmer http://www.3rdworldfarmer.com/

Games What are the mechanics of what a player can do? Run around jump up and down on enemies, move blocks? Launch objects at targets? http://www.molleindustria.org/en/oiligarchy http://petlab.parsons.edu/redCrossSite/rulesWON.html Oiligarchy Red Cross/Red Crescent Climate Center Climate Challenge http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/hottopics/climatechange/climate_challenge/

Games Good Idea but boring http://www.tigweb.org/tiged/projects/ayiti/ Great Game but too long for traditional classroom use Ayiti: The Cost of Life The History Game Canada http://www.historycanadagame.com/

Interactive Gaming and the Teaching of History, Civics & Social Studies