Computer games in class
I read in the news today that computer games are being increasingly used by teachers as a “teaching aid” in the classroom. I had to take my glasses off, rub my eyes, put them back on and read it again before I realised I hadn’t misread it. And you’re not mis-reading this post either.
Schools have “teamed up” with computer games manufacturers to try and produce games that work in the classroom, and if that wasn’t bad enough, they are trying out conventional games in class to see what learning benefit can be gleaned from them.
I’d venture to say, nothing what so ever. Except a lot of un-educated children perhaps and maybe some angry parents thrown in. Has the concept of hard graft and *real* learning gone out of the window to be replaced by hours of sitting in front of a screen making pre-programmed things work in a way they were pre-programmed to do? This is not learning, its foolishness of the highest degree.
A child learns by being enthralled by what they are seeing and hearing, by being able to ask questions of their teacher, by being able TO READ things in books and WRITE things down. By going outside and seeing examples in both the written word and the real world of what they have learned. What use is knowledge when it is confined to 17″ across and the thoughts and ideas of a team of programmers who wrote a game to a tight deadline? Knowledge and learning is broad and long and children need to be exposed to this concept from a young age. It is not possible to quantify this in any number of computer games. Knowledge is to be explored, not spoon fed by simply watching events unfold.
I like to think that for a child the sky is the limit, but when their teachers sit them in front of a screen and sell them out to big games corporations I’m not so sure.
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Niall Said,
January 14, 2006 @ 10:22 pm
Too right. I remember some of the crappy ‘learn french, german and spanish’ software we had at school. i didn’t learn a thing.
That is not to say that some computer games can be educational, logic puzzles for instance, they are very good at training your mind to think in different ways.
Don’t dismiss them outright.