Gaming the Brain Borers
Speaking of attention deficit, people who want to develop educational electronic games suffer from no attention deficit. Here is recent article: Chemistry: the video game
This article reports on the efforts of Gabriela Weaver, an associate professor of chemistry at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. She is developing a computer game about chemistry. It also reports comments from Eric Klopfer, co-director of Education Arcade, a game project run by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
One of the main themes of this report is that it is hard for educational game development to compete with giants like Electronic Arts. I had two thoughts right away: Cosmeo and Second Life. (I know those are not sentences. I don’t know of any requirement that I think in sentences.)
Cosmeo is a commercial enterprise by Discovery Communications Inc. It provides video clips, educational games, and other services to some schools and (via the website) to individuals. Apparently, this corporation believes it can make money with these services. And some school systems apparently believe that the services provide appropriate educational experiences.
Second Life is an online, massively multiplayer, 3D environment. It is not a game, but offers resources that support the development of games. There are dozens of games presently available in Second Life. One, sponsored by Wells-Fargo is intended to provide educational benefits as part of the play. Here are links:
Video Stagecoach Island Preview.
CNET report of game, Stagecoach Island.
The Stagecoach Island plan is a bit different from the usual educational game concept. The learning objectives are about managing money. How effectively the participant does that determines access to things that the participant wants. Rather like in real life.
But what is the cost of this 3D environment? The level of access needed to play a game is available at no cost. Access would demand a computer with fairly modern graphics. But I think the requirements would be similar to the requirements for MS Vista. So any Vista-ready computer can probably handle the job. The cost of facilities to develop a game would be $1,250 plus about $200/month for maintenance. There would, of course, be costs for technical assistance. But Second Life already provides the basic programming infrastructure.
Now back to those people who are focused attentively on developing educational electronic games. I hope they are not so focused on their project objectives that they overlook the possibilities I just described. But they might be. Another name for focus is tunnel vision.
This article reports on the efforts of Gabriela Weaver, an associate professor of chemistry at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. She is developing a computer game about chemistry. It also reports comments from Eric Klopfer, co-director of Education Arcade, a game project run by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
One of the main themes of this report is that it is hard for educational game development to compete with giants like Electronic Arts. I had two thoughts right away: Cosmeo and Second Life. (I know those are not sentences. I don’t know of any requirement that I think in sentences.)
Cosmeo is a commercial enterprise by Discovery Communications Inc. It provides video clips, educational games, and other services to some schools and (via the website) to individuals. Apparently, this corporation believes it can make money with these services. And some school systems apparently believe that the services provide appropriate educational experiences.
Second Life is an online, massively multiplayer, 3D environment. It is not a game, but offers resources that support the development of games. There are dozens of games presently available in Second Life. One, sponsored by Wells-Fargo is intended to provide educational benefits as part of the play. Here are links:
Video Stagecoach Island Preview.
CNET report of game, Stagecoach Island.
The Stagecoach Island plan is a bit different from the usual educational game concept. The learning objectives are about managing money. How effectively the participant does that determines access to things that the participant wants. Rather like in real life.
But what is the cost of this 3D environment? The level of access needed to play a game is available at no cost. Access would demand a computer with fairly modern graphics. But I think the requirements would be similar to the requirements for MS Vista. So any Vista-ready computer can probably handle the job. The cost of facilities to develop a game would be $1,250 plus about $200/month for maintenance. There would, of course, be costs for technical assistance. But Second Life already provides the basic programming infrastructure.
Now back to those people who are focused attentively on developing educational electronic games. I hope they are not so focused on their project objectives that they overlook the possibilities I just described. But they might be. Another name for focus is tunnel vision.
posted by Selby Evans at 9:39 AM
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