An image that represents me at this stage of my professional life:
I have chosen a video on YouTube. Please watch “Monarch Metamorphosis”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZWZNByoJNY
The diagrams below emphasize what can be seen in the video. I will reference certain stages in the life of a butterfly, please refer to the diagrams for assistance. As for myself, I would say that I am currently in the pupa/chrysalis stage in my professional life. When I finish my doctorate, a whole new world will be available to me; therefore I will no longer be a caterpillar crawling around, but a butterfly that can fly.
Reflections on the past: How did I come to be here as an education professional seeking my doctorate? I have included key influences, pivotal early experiences, earlier adult life events/transitions, and academic and career history.
Well, in the life of a butterfly, all individuals begin as an egg. I would equate my egg stage as my childhood and my freshman, sophomore, and junior high school years. I considered many possible careers in this stage of life. Basically I ate and slept, as a larva in an egg does, and remained fairly naïve about life and careers. One big transition was the move from a Detroit suburb to a very small town in Georgia during my senior year of high school. This move really opened my eyes to the “big, wide world” that is out there. It really changed my perspective about life and people (especially culture shock). Unexpectedly, it prepared me for the transition to college. Many of the people I graduated high school with could not make the transition from high school/hometown to college/new town. I made the transition relatively easily. I attribute this ease from facing the same challenge by moving to Georgia in the first place. For this reason, I would equate this experience to the next stage of the butterfly life cycle where the caterpillar (larva) hatches from the egg.
My undergraduate and graduate years would be consistent with the caterpillar stage of the butterfly life cycle. Caterpillars lumber around, eating everything they can. I would say that was me in college; not necessarily eating food, but consuming all the knowledge that I could. I just soaked in everything, academic and first-hand experiences. It was during my graduate school years that I found out that teaching was the right career for me. In graduate school, the college I attended had teaching assistantships available for their graduate students. This was my first experience teaching. It was like a “drug” and I couldn’t get enough. At the time, I was a pre-med student, with hopes of becoming a medical doctor. The combination of teaching experiences and the boredom I was feeling with pre-med curriculum had me facing the facts that medicine wasn’t for me. You know, caterpillars molt as they become too large for their skin. I guess this transition was me “molting” into a career that was right for me. One of my professors, Mike Moulton, also was a huge influence. He was one of the few professors that I’ve had that made class fun. He was great at timing his jokes with the notes so that just about the time you were losing your attention span, he would crack a joke about the material that would make you able to focus again. His classes always had a relaxed atmosphere and he always emphasized learning over testing. He became my mentor. I wanted to be able to teach as he did. So, as I “molted” out of pre-med and into teaching and science, I became one of Mike’s graduate students. When Mike left my college to become a professor at UF, I followed him after I finished my Masters degree. I began working on a PhD in Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, but within a year I realized that I was on the wrong path. I found out the hard way that having a PhD doesn’t enable you to teach. Research is the main focus of careers requiring a PhD. I thought that I would be able to primarily teach and throw in a bit of research, but as things progressed, I realized that very little time is dedicated to teaching. This wasn’t me. I wanted the opposite, to teach most of the time and do some research. So, I “molted” again. I left UF with another Masters degree, instead of a PhD. I went directly into teaching at public schools. This, I would say, is where I entered my chrysalis.
The next stage of a butterfly’s life cycle is to construct a chrysalis (similar to a cocoon) where it enters the pupa stage – a transformation stage. I have been in this stage for almost 12 years, but I feel that it will be over when I finish my doctoral degree. I have been changing from a caterpillar to a butterfly. I have 9 years of teaching experience in the public school system. I have 11 years of teaching experience as a college adjunct. I have switched to a high school outside of the public school system, an adult high school, which is more concerned with curriculum than FCAT scores. This has helped me concentrate more on learning rather than testing (thank you Mike Moulton). And finally I began working on my doctoral degree, a degree that has taken me years to start due to financial and time constraints. I feel like I am in the final stages of becoming a butterfly. When I have my degree, I will completely switch worlds. You see, a caterpillar is tied to gravity; constrained to the plant on which it lives; seeing the world from one perspective (i.e., me teaching students). I feel that when I become a butterfly, I will be free of gravity and able to see the world from a new perspective (i.e., me teaching teachers). This is when I will truly fly!
Reflections on the present: How would you describe yourself currently in terms of what you are like as an adult learner (for example: what recent life events or transitions have been important? What are your learning preferences and strengths? What aspects of learning cause you anxiety? What are your learning habits?) and as an education professional (for example: what are recent career experiences, interests, challenges, responsibilities, etc.)
The college where I work has a motto that “the primary enemy of great is good.” In other words, you must constantly be trying to better yourself and never be happy with status quo. They really want their employees to be life-long learners and so they set aside time and money specifically for this purpose. For this reason, I have been an adult learner for over 10 years now. I think the biggest transition in becoming an adult learner is to NOT believe that you know everything and won’t get anything out of a class. I have taken classes where I have more education about the subject than the teacher, but I still can learn something from the teacher. It may not necessarily be about the subject, it may be about teaching or life, but it could also be about the subject too. No one knows absolutely everything about a subject and the attitude that an adult learner must take is that something, no matter how big or how small, can be gained from the class if you are open to learning. So, I believe that is the key to being an adult learner, to be open to learning.
As for my learning habits, I think those are more person-specific. I mean everyone learns differently and only that person can tell you the best way for him or her to learn. Personally, I realized that I no longer could read something and have it instantly memorized, as I did when I was young. Now, I read something and take notes on it or from it, and this helps me really comprehend the point the article or book is trying to make. Also re-organizing the material into an outline or flowchart helps me get my ideas in order. Because I know me and how I learn, I no longer have any classroom anxiety. No testing anxiety or worrying over projects, either. I think my strength comes from my confidence. I do things in a timely manner, never the last minute, and I make sure I thoroughly understand the material. For these reasons I am confident in my learning and don’t stress.
I have done a lot of transforming as an education professional. When I first started teaching in public school, I had no experience or training in K-12 teaching. I remember that when I received my first lesson planner, I had no idea what to do with it since I had never before written a lesson plan. When I first began teaching, my main goal was trying to please my administrators. When I left public school teaching, my main goal was what I should be teaching my students. This was a main reason for me leaving public school. I couldn’t handle how the focus was no longer on learning, but mainly on testing (FCAT). We were flat-out told to teach to the test. I couldn’t see how that philosophy would help any of my students in the “real” world. My interests in teaching and my confidence as a teacher had shifted to the point where I could stand up for myself and my beliefs in teaching. So, I left public school and found a high school at the local college campus where teaching and learning were the focus, not testing. I’ve never looked back.
Projections into the future: How do you see the doctorate as helping you achieve certain goals and aspirations? What alternative visions of the future do you hold? How will you continue to engage in lifelong learning? Name professional organizations and publications central to your professional goals.
As I previously said, this doctorate will be the finishing touch in my transformation into a butterfly. I will have transformed from a teacher who taught science to students into a teacher who teaches teachers how to teach. I want to teach these potential teachers that it isn’t all about paperwork and FCAT scores. I want them to know that teaching students how to think is the best gift you can give them. I mean looking up facts and figures today is easy when you have technology. But, teaching students how to solve problems, to think critically, and be innovative is what will help them really succeed in life. THAT is what teachers should teach. THAT is what will never show up on any FCAT score. This degree will help me open the eyes of these potential teachers so that they will have their priorities straight about teaching vs. testing.
One of the alternative visions of the future that I have is that perhaps my main job isn’t teaching teachers, but setting up and running a model high school. The college I work for is very progressive and allows the high school employees to set up the high school as we see fit. For example, we are implementing a career pathways plan this year. One of the other ideas we are trying to implement are cross-over classes. These classes incorporate two or three subjects in one class. For instance, a new Florida History class incorporates a history class and an English class. Another possible example is a medical journalism class that would incorporate science (including anatomy and physiology) and journalism (English). Eventually, I would like to see classes that incorporate all subjects at once, because this is what you find out in the “real” world. Problems in life are very rarely split into English, math, science, history, etc. Usually it takes a little math, a little science, a little English, and so on to solve these situations. Why not have classes that do the same? These classes would teach you all of the subjects but incorporated all at once, as you find in life’s daily tribulations. Setting up this type of model school would be an alternative option to my goal of teaching teachers.
I plan on being a life-long learner in the respect that I don’t plan on stopping with this doctorate. I plan on continuing my education and perhaps earning another doctorate. I also understand that as new technologies and teaching theories/styles/media develop, I will need to learn them. Therefore, I will always be a student. Thankfully, I work for an institution that shares this opinion and who offers many classes to enable my learning goals. Also, due to distance education, I have many good programs and colleges (UF, for example) that will also continue my objective to be a life-long learner.
I am currently a member of NSTA, FACC, and ACE, which are science, Florida community colleges, and adult-learning, respectively. I also attend FETC regularly. But I will need to broaden my associations to incorporate technology and gaming too. Therefore, I will probably join the Association for Educational Communications and Technology, the Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education, and The International Game Developers Association to name a few. I also, more recently, have found publications that would be ideal for me to read and publish: Phi Delta Kappan, the Journal of Research on Computing Education, the Journal of Research in Science Teaching, Computers in Education, Journal of Interactive Learning Research, and Innovate.
08 May 2011
01 May 2011
Book Review for EME 5054
Book Review: How Computer Games Help Children Learn
Bibliographic Heading:
Shaffer, D. W. (2006). How Computer Games Help Children Learn. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
About the Author:
David Williamson Shaffer is an Associate Professor of Learning Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a game scientist at the Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Laboratory (Shaffer 2006). Dr. Shaffer is a former teacher, curriculum developer, teacher trainer, and school technology specialist. He has taught grades 4-12 in the US and abroad, including 2 years working with the Asian Development Bank and the US Peace Corps in Nepal. Shaffer's MS and PhD are from the Media Laboratory at MIT, where his work focused on the development and evaluation of technology-supported learning environments. After completing doctoral studies he taught and conducted research at the Technology and Education Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. He developed curricula and online tools that help students understand the impact of technology on society, and created technology-based learning systems for new medical devices and procedures. His research interests include how computational media change the way people think and learn (Wisconsin Center 2008). Shaffer recently won a National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award for his work on Alternate Routes to Technology and Science. His other recent awards include a Spencer Foundation National Academy of Education Postdoctoral Fellowship and an appointment as a research scientist at the Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Lab (Innovate 2008).
Shaffer’s main reason for writing this book is thoroughly covered in the introduction by describing the critical problems in education today and how it will affect tomorrow. In essence, he believes that under our current education policies educators are preparing students for standardization instead of innovative careers. His solution to this crisis is education through epistemology, in other words, teaching students how to think, rather than teaching them a few facts. One of the ways he incorporates epistemology into education is through epistemic gaming. Shaffer wrote this book to thoroughly describe epistemic gaming and to offer epistemic gaming as a solution to “standardized thinking.”
Content:
In his introduction, Shaffer explains why he wrote this book. He points out that America’s competitive edge increasingly comes from how it can produce products, services, and technologies that are new, special, nonstandard – thus not easily reproduced across the globe by competitors. Shaffer predicts that in the very near future, the only good jobs left will be for people who can do innovative and creative work. “At its core, though, this is a crisis in education,” says Shaffer (p. 3). He claims that education today in the U.S. is preparing students for standardized jobs. “Our government and schools have made a noble effort to leave no child behind: to ensure, through standardized testing, that all children make adequate yearly progress. But we can’t “skill and drill” our way to innovation because standardized testing produces standardized skills,” (p.3). According to Shaffer, our standards-driven curricula are not preparing children to be innovators. “We are in danger of leaving all of our children far behind in the new global competition for innovative work,” says Shaffer (p.4). The upside is that the very same technologies that are making it possible to outsource jobs make it possible for students to prepare for innovative work. According to Shaffer, experts believed that the computer could teach students to solve problems, answer questions on tests, do better in school, learn by doing things that are meaningful and motivating, and in general, make it possible for students and teachers to think about learning in a new way (p. 4). Shaffer believes that the key to solving the current crisis in education will be to use the power of computer and video games to give all children access to experiences and interactions that build interest and understanding. “Computer and video games can change education because computers now make it possible to learn on a massive scale by doing the things that people do in the world outside school. They make it possible for students to learn to think in innovative and creative ways just as innovators in the real world learn to think creatively,” (p. 9). This book is about how computers and video games can help educators rebuild education for a high-tech world by thinking about learning in a new way.
When it comes to educators changing their positions, Shaffer vehemently argues that “computers create both the means and the necessity to fundamentally re-think what it means to know something – and thus what is worth learning and how educators teach it,” (p. 9). He suggests that teachers have to develop the tools to help young people learn epistemologies of creative innovation. One way to do this is through epistemic games: games that are fundamentally about learning to think in innovative ways. The view of learning this book presents emphasizes understanding about how people think and how educators can best help them learn to think more deeply, more compassionately, and more effectively about the problems and situations they will encounter in the world. Shaffer presents ideas about learning that takes two new and important directions: 1) about how learning can happen in games – primarily computer and video games; and 2) about what children need to prepare for the economic and social conditions that new technologies are creating, (p. 11).
This book looks at each element of innovative thinking – epistemology, knowledge, skills, values, and identity – in separate chapters. Each chapter also looks at a specific game: a game to provide concrete examples of the concepts discussed in each chapter and to provide images of what a new way of thinking about learning might look like. Shaffer specifically does this because “building a new educational system for the digital age is a big undertaking” and his hope is “to begin that process of change by providing an image of what we need to do and how we might do it,” (p. 13).
In chapter one, Shaffer describes the debating game in reference to epistemology. In short, this is a game where two teams debate a topic, in this case the Spanish American War, as judges rate the performance of each team (pro or con). The students must defend their position, and may use technology for research, but technology is not a requirement for the game. This game is considered epistemic because participants must think about issues the way historians do: to understand complex situations and develop and defend their own point of view on controversial issues. The Debating Game is about finding creative solutions to problems rather than looking for right and wrong answers. Shaffer makes a point that new technologies may not be required to build better educational games, but suggests looking at the next chapter to see how a computer game makes it possible for players to learn in “new and powerful” ways.
The second chapter relates knowledge to two games, SodaConstructor and Digital Zoo. Shaffer describes this chapter as “looking how computers change what it means to think and thus what it means to learn,” (p. 41). Students use SodaConstructor to design shapes (or creatures) according to the rules of gravity and motion. Fundamentally, this game helps students learn about physics and engineering. To play Digital Zoo, students join design teams where they get design specifications from a client who wants to develop prototypes, perhaps for an animated movie. To get their creatures to stand up, walk, fly, jump, or just plain withstand gravity, students work on a series of engineering design projects using SodaConstructor, leading to the construction of virtual objects and creatures. Players advance in Digital Zoo by producing designs for clients, but at each level, the client’s requirements become more complex. To meet those needs, players have to do more than simply interact with the computer; they have to learn to do what engineers do by thinking the way engineers think. Shaffer says, “In the process of making creatures that stand, walk, and even dance, players learned to use specialized language: technical terms and concepts from physics and engineering,” (p.58). He goes on to explain that “the specialized vocabulary that players develop in Digital Zoo is knowledge rather than mere jargon because it is not a set of unrelated terms or isolated facts,” (p. 59). This falls into the epistemic category since players are trying to think like engineers – in aspects of science and technology. Shaffer enforces the idea that knowledge and epistemology go hand in hand by arguing that “when children learn important concepts – and the words that go with them – to solve problems that are meaningful to them, the words go from empty jargon to seeing the world through the eyes of innovative professionals,” (p. 60). Shaffer continues by describing simulations since, in his opinion, “any game, at its core, is a simulation,” (p. 69). He argues that all games create an alternate universe – a microworld – that operates by particular rules and that players can explore. Epistemic games are based on simulations of interesting and important problems, where the framework for understanding what happens is based on the way that people who analyze and solve problems as innovative and creative thinkers.
In the third chapter, the author relates skills to epistemic games through a game called Escher’s World. In this game, players become graphic artists and create an exhibit of mathematical art in the style of M. C. Escher. The author uses the experiences of students with Escher’s World to demonstrate how learning to think like a professional means learning to act like one – and thus how the training of professionals provides a model for learning. One student uses criticism from her teachers and peers to expand her project. Another student uses the critiques and experiences from Escher’s World to expand her confidence and abilities to deal with other classes and situations. Shaffer points out that in both cases, the students learn the benefits of criticism and hence learn collaboration. He says this is important because “innovative professionals find creative solutions to complex problems by constantly working just beyond the boundary of what they can already do by themselves and they learn to do this originally in a professional practicum by working on problems and talking about them with peers and mentors,” (p. 100). For example, in Shaffer’s student experiences with Escher’s World, the knowledge they learned helped them build skills and new ways of thinking and acting like a professional which can bleed over into other areas of their life.
Shaffer ties values with a game called The Pandora Project in the fourth chapter. “This chapter focuses on the values of professional practices: on how thinking and working like a professional means caring about the things a professional cares about – and thus how learning to think like a professional means learning to value the things professionals think of as important, interesting, and meaningful,” (p. 105). In The Pandora Project, players become high-powered negotiators, deciding the fate (ethics) of a new biomedical breakthrough: transplanting organs from animals into humans. Shaffer demonstrates how this epistemic game motivated adolescents to develop the kind of skills, knowledge, and values they need to succeed. By using biology, international relations, and mediation, students must look at the potential transplantation in a variety of ways: 1) is it ethical to raise genetically altered animals, in a quarantined state, to harvest their organs; 2) by transplanting from animal to human, does this open the door to new viral epidemics; 3) is it ethical to say no to someone that desperately needs an organ transplant; and so on. This type of epistemic game helps players to learn to care about the kind of problems that doctors, lawyers, diplomats, and other innovative professionals face, and to develop the skills, knowledge, and ways of thinking that are used to solve such problems.
The fifth chapter, according to Shaffer, “is about what it means to be an innovative professional: how thinking and working like a professional means seeing oneself as a professional, and vice versa. It is about how professional training helps people learn to identify themselves as professionals, and why playing a game based on that process is so powerful for adolescents as they are making a developmental transition from childhood into the adult world,” (p. 135). Shaffer uses science.net which is an epistemic game where players become journalists, reporting on scientific and technological breakthroughs for an online newsmagazine. Shaffer demonstrates how skills, knowledge, values, epistemology and identity come together in the work of one group of innovative professionals. He goes on to suggest that “identity is central to a practicum, for example, part of learning to think like a journalist is that the student must think of himself or herself as a journalist,” (p. 150). In science.net, players learned about science by writing about science as reporters, therefore, they came to science through a journalistic perspective. Experiences, like this one, that transfer from one context to another are certainly the goal in the development of educational games, according to Shaffer. He states: “The premise of education is that it is possible for one experience to influence another in this general sense. Otherwise there is no education and no learning,’ (p. 157). Shaffer continues his argument by defining clearly the meaning of epistemic games: “an epistemic game is a game that deliberately creates the epistemic frame of a socially valued community by re-creating the process by which individuals develop the skills, knowledge, identities, values, and epistemology of that community,” (p. 164). Shaffer suggests that “the epistemic frame of a professional is built during a professional practicum, and epistemic games based on these practicum experiences can develop these innovative ways of thinking and working for students who otherwise would be memorizing facts for standardized tests,” (p. 165).
In chapter six, the final chapter, Shaffer discusses how epistemic games based on professional innovation can change the way educators teach. He discusses what is special about epistemic games, how they are different from ordinary commercial games, and how they are different from the usual school activities. Shaffer does this by comparing the game Urban Science and the game SimCity. The author doesn’t consider SimCity an epistemic game because players are not learning to think about how cities work from the perspective of any real professional. He suggests that SimCity is a “God Game” because players are not responsible for any social process of decision making within the virtual world (p. 171). In other words, they face consequence for their actions, but they are free to do whatever they want, however irrational, destructive, or unrealistic. Urban Science, on the other hand, is a game about urban ecology that actually does get players thinking the way professionals think about the complex and ill-defined problems that urban areas face. “Just like real planners, players have to balance the overall impact of their proposals against the costs and benefits – economic, social, and environmental – of alternative choices,” (p.173). Within this chapter, Shaffer continues to expand on his ideas to change education. He shows how the next steps toward education may be with epistemic games. The author reminds the reader that “the best hope for a better way of educating children for life in the digital age is for adults to think about learning in a new way: to think about helping young people develop the epistemic frames of professional innovation,” (p.1 92).
In summation, this is a book about thinking and learning and how we can use epistemic games to make it possible for all children to learn in ways that are deeply authentic, fulfilling, powerful, motivating, and, most of all, relevant. It is about using computer games to help students learn important ideas in ways that will be meaningful and useful in tomorrow’s world. This book shows how computer and video games – though games of a very special sort – can transform education to meet the challenge of innovation in a global economy. Students don’t have to wait until they start college, graduate school, or enter the workforce to begin thinking innovatively because these epistemic games teach players how to think creatively which helps them think like a professional. As Shaffer emphasizes, “we all can learn from and about games,” (p. 15).
Critique:
Personally, anyone who sees the potential of learning through games or any educator who understands how crucial it is to prepare students for the high-tech, digital world of tomorrow should read this book. Shaffer makes a very valid point that the majority of jobs in the U.S. that require standardized skills can very easily be outsourced to other countries, (p. 1). This is true, a standardized problem can be solved anywhere. For example, a radiologist in India reads x-rays taken from a patient in Indiana. Even when someone gives their order at fast-food drive-thru, the person speaking to them may not be in the building, neighborhood, or even the country, as some places have the drive-thru monitored by people in another country. And these are just two of many examples of out-sourcing standardized jobs. What a scary prospect for people who will be looking for careers in the future! This really drives home the point that educators need to be innovative at all costs.
Shaffer makes a valid point about the importance of games. He declares that “developmental psychologists have known for nearly a century that children learn from playing games; therefore, play and exploration and experimentation matter,” (p. 6). He goes on to argue that “computers allow us to work with simulations of the world around us that let us play with reality by creating imaginary worlds,” (p. 7). These two statements validate his ideas that technology and gaming belong in the classroom. And when you combine the two, games can provide the framework in which a player can interact within a computer simulation. According to Shaffer’s arguments, the whole goal of education should be epistemology, getting students to learn how to think, rather than learning what to think. The epistemic games that Shaffer uses (i.e., science.net, Urban Science, Digital Zoo, and so on) suggest that technology and epistemic games could very well solve the current crisis in education. Shaffer enthusiastically supports his argument that epistemic gaming could be a key solution to the standardization of American education. According to the author “computers let us do more than we know how to do on our own – and thus let kids do things that innovative professionals do, and learn the ways of innovative thinking in the process,” (p. 73). Shaffer’s arguments are well-thought out and presented in a way that is hard to argue.
One criticism is his presentation of the idea of epistemology. Shaffer doesn’t really define the concept when he first presents the term. He says “epistemology is the study of what it means to know something,” (p. 9). Unfortunately, if the reader is not acquainted with the word prior to reading this section, the term epistemology may not be well understood until dozens of pages and examples later. Shaffer should have done a better job in explain this term since it is central to his arguments.
Another criticism of this book is Shaffer’s idea that epistemic games should be done in “third places.” The author introduces the term “third places” which refers to “places that are not home nor work, but places where people can go to “hang out” – to build community, share triumphs and losses, and in the process deal with issues, problems, and concerns that can’t be fully expressed within the confines of the family or the structures of a job,” (p. 181). Shafer suggests that epistemic games do not fit well with the culture of schools. “It is hard for teachers to spare the time from getting students ready for the next standardized test, and, not surprisingly, innovation is difficult to accomplish in forty-minute chunks of time, spread from room to room and subject to subject throughout the day,” says Shafer (p. 183). Shafer suggest that since epistemic games are “third places” that that is where they work best; therefore, children should play these games in other third places like clubs, after-school programs, summer camps, and community centers. “There, these games can develop according to their own intrinsic logic, to explore the highest potential of what learning might be – and what education could become – in the digital age. As a third space between formal instruction and free play, epistemic games can explore what can happen to games when the primary focus is on learning rather than on market forces in commercial game production or on the institutional imperatives of schools as they currently exist,” (p. 183). If Shaffer is so adamant about changing education, why wouldn’t he want to introduce his solution, epistemic games, into the source of education, that being schools. Shaffer works hard to suggest that the standardization of education is rampant in schools. Therefore, it would make sense to introduce innovative thinking through epistemic gaming directly to schools. Shaffer doesn’t justify his argument of only using epistemic gaming in “third places.”
Overall, this book gives hope to many parents and teachers who see today’s crisis in education. Shaffer opens the world of epistemic gaming to educators. The whole point of this book is for students to succeed, be happy, and have the ability to make the world a better place. What more could an educator ask for?
Rating:
On a scale of one to five stars, where one is the least and five the greatest, I would rate this book at four and a half stars.
Bibliography:
Innovate: Journal of Online Education. (2008). Board Member: Biographical Sketch. Retrieved October 27, 2008, from http://innovateonline.info/?view=person&id=5660.
Shaffer, D. W. (2006). How Computer Games Help Children Learn. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Wisconsin Center for Education Research. (2008). People Page. Retrieved October 27, 2008, from http://www.wcer.wisc.edu/people/staff.php?sid=1150.
Bibliographic Heading:
Shaffer, D. W. (2006). How Computer Games Help Children Learn. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
About the Author:
David Williamson Shaffer is an Associate Professor of Learning Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a game scientist at the Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Laboratory (Shaffer 2006). Dr. Shaffer is a former teacher, curriculum developer, teacher trainer, and school technology specialist. He has taught grades 4-12 in the US and abroad, including 2 years working with the Asian Development Bank and the US Peace Corps in Nepal. Shaffer's MS and PhD are from the Media Laboratory at MIT, where his work focused on the development and evaluation of technology-supported learning environments. After completing doctoral studies he taught and conducted research at the Technology and Education Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. He developed curricula and online tools that help students understand the impact of technology on society, and created technology-based learning systems for new medical devices and procedures. His research interests include how computational media change the way people think and learn (Wisconsin Center 2008). Shaffer recently won a National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award for his work on Alternate Routes to Technology and Science. His other recent awards include a Spencer Foundation National Academy of Education Postdoctoral Fellowship and an appointment as a research scientist at the Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Lab (Innovate 2008).
Shaffer’s main reason for writing this book is thoroughly covered in the introduction by describing the critical problems in education today and how it will affect tomorrow. In essence, he believes that under our current education policies educators are preparing students for standardization instead of innovative careers. His solution to this crisis is education through epistemology, in other words, teaching students how to think, rather than teaching them a few facts. One of the ways he incorporates epistemology into education is through epistemic gaming. Shaffer wrote this book to thoroughly describe epistemic gaming and to offer epistemic gaming as a solution to “standardized thinking.”
Content:
In his introduction, Shaffer explains why he wrote this book. He points out that America’s competitive edge increasingly comes from how it can produce products, services, and technologies that are new, special, nonstandard – thus not easily reproduced across the globe by competitors. Shaffer predicts that in the very near future, the only good jobs left will be for people who can do innovative and creative work. “At its core, though, this is a crisis in education,” says Shaffer (p. 3). He claims that education today in the U.S. is preparing students for standardized jobs. “Our government and schools have made a noble effort to leave no child behind: to ensure, through standardized testing, that all children make adequate yearly progress. But we can’t “skill and drill” our way to innovation because standardized testing produces standardized skills,” (p.3). According to Shaffer, our standards-driven curricula are not preparing children to be innovators. “We are in danger of leaving all of our children far behind in the new global competition for innovative work,” says Shaffer (p.4). The upside is that the very same technologies that are making it possible to outsource jobs make it possible for students to prepare for innovative work. According to Shaffer, experts believed that the computer could teach students to solve problems, answer questions on tests, do better in school, learn by doing things that are meaningful and motivating, and in general, make it possible for students and teachers to think about learning in a new way (p. 4). Shaffer believes that the key to solving the current crisis in education will be to use the power of computer and video games to give all children access to experiences and interactions that build interest and understanding. “Computer and video games can change education because computers now make it possible to learn on a massive scale by doing the things that people do in the world outside school. They make it possible for students to learn to think in innovative and creative ways just as innovators in the real world learn to think creatively,” (p. 9). This book is about how computers and video games can help educators rebuild education for a high-tech world by thinking about learning in a new way.
When it comes to educators changing their positions, Shaffer vehemently argues that “computers create both the means and the necessity to fundamentally re-think what it means to know something – and thus what is worth learning and how educators teach it,” (p. 9). He suggests that teachers have to develop the tools to help young people learn epistemologies of creative innovation. One way to do this is through epistemic games: games that are fundamentally about learning to think in innovative ways. The view of learning this book presents emphasizes understanding about how people think and how educators can best help them learn to think more deeply, more compassionately, and more effectively about the problems and situations they will encounter in the world. Shaffer presents ideas about learning that takes two new and important directions: 1) about how learning can happen in games – primarily computer and video games; and 2) about what children need to prepare for the economic and social conditions that new technologies are creating, (p. 11).
This book looks at each element of innovative thinking – epistemology, knowledge, skills, values, and identity – in separate chapters. Each chapter also looks at a specific game: a game to provide concrete examples of the concepts discussed in each chapter and to provide images of what a new way of thinking about learning might look like. Shaffer specifically does this because “building a new educational system for the digital age is a big undertaking” and his hope is “to begin that process of change by providing an image of what we need to do and how we might do it,” (p. 13).
In chapter one, Shaffer describes the debating game in reference to epistemology. In short, this is a game where two teams debate a topic, in this case the Spanish American War, as judges rate the performance of each team (pro or con). The students must defend their position, and may use technology for research, but technology is not a requirement for the game. This game is considered epistemic because participants must think about issues the way historians do: to understand complex situations and develop and defend their own point of view on controversial issues. The Debating Game is about finding creative solutions to problems rather than looking for right and wrong answers. Shaffer makes a point that new technologies may not be required to build better educational games, but suggests looking at the next chapter to see how a computer game makes it possible for players to learn in “new and powerful” ways.
The second chapter relates knowledge to two games, SodaConstructor and Digital Zoo. Shaffer describes this chapter as “looking how computers change what it means to think and thus what it means to learn,” (p. 41). Students use SodaConstructor to design shapes (or creatures) according to the rules of gravity and motion. Fundamentally, this game helps students learn about physics and engineering. To play Digital Zoo, students join design teams where they get design specifications from a client who wants to develop prototypes, perhaps for an animated movie. To get their creatures to stand up, walk, fly, jump, or just plain withstand gravity, students work on a series of engineering design projects using SodaConstructor, leading to the construction of virtual objects and creatures. Players advance in Digital Zoo by producing designs for clients, but at each level, the client’s requirements become more complex. To meet those needs, players have to do more than simply interact with the computer; they have to learn to do what engineers do by thinking the way engineers think. Shaffer says, “In the process of making creatures that stand, walk, and even dance, players learned to use specialized language: technical terms and concepts from physics and engineering,” (p.58). He goes on to explain that “the specialized vocabulary that players develop in Digital Zoo is knowledge rather than mere jargon because it is not a set of unrelated terms or isolated facts,” (p. 59). This falls into the epistemic category since players are trying to think like engineers – in aspects of science and technology. Shaffer enforces the idea that knowledge and epistemology go hand in hand by arguing that “when children learn important concepts – and the words that go with them – to solve problems that are meaningful to them, the words go from empty jargon to seeing the world through the eyes of innovative professionals,” (p. 60). Shaffer continues by describing simulations since, in his opinion, “any game, at its core, is a simulation,” (p. 69). He argues that all games create an alternate universe – a microworld – that operates by particular rules and that players can explore. Epistemic games are based on simulations of interesting and important problems, where the framework for understanding what happens is based on the way that people who analyze and solve problems as innovative and creative thinkers.
In the third chapter, the author relates skills to epistemic games through a game called Escher’s World. In this game, players become graphic artists and create an exhibit of mathematical art in the style of M. C. Escher. The author uses the experiences of students with Escher’s World to demonstrate how learning to think like a professional means learning to act like one – and thus how the training of professionals provides a model for learning. One student uses criticism from her teachers and peers to expand her project. Another student uses the critiques and experiences from Escher’s World to expand her confidence and abilities to deal with other classes and situations. Shaffer points out that in both cases, the students learn the benefits of criticism and hence learn collaboration. He says this is important because “innovative professionals find creative solutions to complex problems by constantly working just beyond the boundary of what they can already do by themselves and they learn to do this originally in a professional practicum by working on problems and talking about them with peers and mentors,” (p. 100). For example, in Shaffer’s student experiences with Escher’s World, the knowledge they learned helped them build skills and new ways of thinking and acting like a professional which can bleed over into other areas of their life.
Shaffer ties values with a game called The Pandora Project in the fourth chapter. “This chapter focuses on the values of professional practices: on how thinking and working like a professional means caring about the things a professional cares about – and thus how learning to think like a professional means learning to value the things professionals think of as important, interesting, and meaningful,” (p. 105). In The Pandora Project, players become high-powered negotiators, deciding the fate (ethics) of a new biomedical breakthrough: transplanting organs from animals into humans. Shaffer demonstrates how this epistemic game motivated adolescents to develop the kind of skills, knowledge, and values they need to succeed. By using biology, international relations, and mediation, students must look at the potential transplantation in a variety of ways: 1) is it ethical to raise genetically altered animals, in a quarantined state, to harvest their organs; 2) by transplanting from animal to human, does this open the door to new viral epidemics; 3) is it ethical to say no to someone that desperately needs an organ transplant; and so on. This type of epistemic game helps players to learn to care about the kind of problems that doctors, lawyers, diplomats, and other innovative professionals face, and to develop the skills, knowledge, and ways of thinking that are used to solve such problems.
The fifth chapter, according to Shaffer, “is about what it means to be an innovative professional: how thinking and working like a professional means seeing oneself as a professional, and vice versa. It is about how professional training helps people learn to identify themselves as professionals, and why playing a game based on that process is so powerful for adolescents as they are making a developmental transition from childhood into the adult world,” (p. 135). Shaffer uses science.net which is an epistemic game where players become journalists, reporting on scientific and technological breakthroughs for an online newsmagazine. Shaffer demonstrates how skills, knowledge, values, epistemology and identity come together in the work of one group of innovative professionals. He goes on to suggest that “identity is central to a practicum, for example, part of learning to think like a journalist is that the student must think of himself or herself as a journalist,” (p. 150). In science.net, players learned about science by writing about science as reporters, therefore, they came to science through a journalistic perspective. Experiences, like this one, that transfer from one context to another are certainly the goal in the development of educational games, according to Shaffer. He states: “The premise of education is that it is possible for one experience to influence another in this general sense. Otherwise there is no education and no learning,’ (p. 157). Shaffer continues his argument by defining clearly the meaning of epistemic games: “an epistemic game is a game that deliberately creates the epistemic frame of a socially valued community by re-creating the process by which individuals develop the skills, knowledge, identities, values, and epistemology of that community,” (p. 164). Shaffer suggests that “the epistemic frame of a professional is built during a professional practicum, and epistemic games based on these practicum experiences can develop these innovative ways of thinking and working for students who otherwise would be memorizing facts for standardized tests,” (p. 165).
In chapter six, the final chapter, Shaffer discusses how epistemic games based on professional innovation can change the way educators teach. He discusses what is special about epistemic games, how they are different from ordinary commercial games, and how they are different from the usual school activities. Shaffer does this by comparing the game Urban Science and the game SimCity. The author doesn’t consider SimCity an epistemic game because players are not learning to think about how cities work from the perspective of any real professional. He suggests that SimCity is a “God Game” because players are not responsible for any social process of decision making within the virtual world (p. 171). In other words, they face consequence for their actions, but they are free to do whatever they want, however irrational, destructive, or unrealistic. Urban Science, on the other hand, is a game about urban ecology that actually does get players thinking the way professionals think about the complex and ill-defined problems that urban areas face. “Just like real planners, players have to balance the overall impact of their proposals against the costs and benefits – economic, social, and environmental – of alternative choices,” (p.173). Within this chapter, Shaffer continues to expand on his ideas to change education. He shows how the next steps toward education may be with epistemic games. The author reminds the reader that “the best hope for a better way of educating children for life in the digital age is for adults to think about learning in a new way: to think about helping young people develop the epistemic frames of professional innovation,” (p.1 92).
In summation, this is a book about thinking and learning and how we can use epistemic games to make it possible for all children to learn in ways that are deeply authentic, fulfilling, powerful, motivating, and, most of all, relevant. It is about using computer games to help students learn important ideas in ways that will be meaningful and useful in tomorrow’s world. This book shows how computer and video games – though games of a very special sort – can transform education to meet the challenge of innovation in a global economy. Students don’t have to wait until they start college, graduate school, or enter the workforce to begin thinking innovatively because these epistemic games teach players how to think creatively which helps them think like a professional. As Shaffer emphasizes, “we all can learn from and about games,” (p. 15).
Critique:
Personally, anyone who sees the potential of learning through games or any educator who understands how crucial it is to prepare students for the high-tech, digital world of tomorrow should read this book. Shaffer makes a very valid point that the majority of jobs in the U.S. that require standardized skills can very easily be outsourced to other countries, (p. 1). This is true, a standardized problem can be solved anywhere. For example, a radiologist in India reads x-rays taken from a patient in Indiana. Even when someone gives their order at fast-food drive-thru, the person speaking to them may not be in the building, neighborhood, or even the country, as some places have the drive-thru monitored by people in another country. And these are just two of many examples of out-sourcing standardized jobs. What a scary prospect for people who will be looking for careers in the future! This really drives home the point that educators need to be innovative at all costs.
Shaffer makes a valid point about the importance of games. He declares that “developmental psychologists have known for nearly a century that children learn from playing games; therefore, play and exploration and experimentation matter,” (p. 6). He goes on to argue that “computers allow us to work with simulations of the world around us that let us play with reality by creating imaginary worlds,” (p. 7). These two statements validate his ideas that technology and gaming belong in the classroom. And when you combine the two, games can provide the framework in which a player can interact within a computer simulation. According to Shaffer’s arguments, the whole goal of education should be epistemology, getting students to learn how to think, rather than learning what to think. The epistemic games that Shaffer uses (i.e., science.net, Urban Science, Digital Zoo, and so on) suggest that technology and epistemic games could very well solve the current crisis in education. Shaffer enthusiastically supports his argument that epistemic gaming could be a key solution to the standardization of American education. According to the author “computers let us do more than we know how to do on our own – and thus let kids do things that innovative professionals do, and learn the ways of innovative thinking in the process,” (p. 73). Shaffer’s arguments are well-thought out and presented in a way that is hard to argue.
One criticism is his presentation of the idea of epistemology. Shaffer doesn’t really define the concept when he first presents the term. He says “epistemology is the study of what it means to know something,” (p. 9). Unfortunately, if the reader is not acquainted with the word prior to reading this section, the term epistemology may not be well understood until dozens of pages and examples later. Shaffer should have done a better job in explain this term since it is central to his arguments.
Another criticism of this book is Shaffer’s idea that epistemic games should be done in “third places.” The author introduces the term “third places” which refers to “places that are not home nor work, but places where people can go to “hang out” – to build community, share triumphs and losses, and in the process deal with issues, problems, and concerns that can’t be fully expressed within the confines of the family or the structures of a job,” (p. 181). Shafer suggests that epistemic games do not fit well with the culture of schools. “It is hard for teachers to spare the time from getting students ready for the next standardized test, and, not surprisingly, innovation is difficult to accomplish in forty-minute chunks of time, spread from room to room and subject to subject throughout the day,” says Shafer (p. 183). Shafer suggest that since epistemic games are “third places” that that is where they work best; therefore, children should play these games in other third places like clubs, after-school programs, summer camps, and community centers. “There, these games can develop according to their own intrinsic logic, to explore the highest potential of what learning might be – and what education could become – in the digital age. As a third space between formal instruction and free play, epistemic games can explore what can happen to games when the primary focus is on learning rather than on market forces in commercial game production or on the institutional imperatives of schools as they currently exist,” (p. 183). If Shaffer is so adamant about changing education, why wouldn’t he want to introduce his solution, epistemic games, into the source of education, that being schools. Shaffer works hard to suggest that the standardization of education is rampant in schools. Therefore, it would make sense to introduce innovative thinking through epistemic gaming directly to schools. Shaffer doesn’t justify his argument of only using epistemic gaming in “third places.”
Overall, this book gives hope to many parents and teachers who see today’s crisis in education. Shaffer opens the world of epistemic gaming to educators. The whole point of this book is for students to succeed, be happy, and have the ability to make the world a better place. What more could an educator ask for?
Rating:
On a scale of one to five stars, where one is the least and five the greatest, I would rate this book at four and a half stars.
Bibliography:
Innovate: Journal of Online Education. (2008). Board Member: Biographical Sketch. Retrieved October 27, 2008, from http://innovateonline.info/?view=person&id=5660.
Shaffer, D. W. (2006). How Computer Games Help Children Learn. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Wisconsin Center for Education Research. (2008). People Page. Retrieved October 27, 2008, from http://www.wcer.wisc.edu/people/staff.php?sid=1150.
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