激情快播

Summer 2015聽| By Susan Frith

An adventurous boy was playing in the laboratory when an explosion shrank him to the size of a Bunsen burner. Now he bounds through the air, picking up molecules and combining them into chemical compounds to put out a fire or blow up a wall 鈥� all part of his quest to get through the lab and return to his normal size.

That鈥檚 the premise behind 鈥淐ompounded,鈥� an educational video game for eighth- graders designed by students at . 鈥淐ompounded鈥� is different from the entertainment games the graduate students typically learn to make during their time at FIEA. 鈥淲e鈥檙e all here because we want to make the next 鈥楬alo,鈥� 鈥� says programmer Lia Cuella, but this assignment to create an educational game relevant to current state curriculum took extra research. 鈥淲e started looking up the [for education],鈥� she says. 鈥淭hen we had to make sure our great idea would actually teach something to the kids instead of just being a game.鈥�

According to Tom Carbone, FIEA鈥檚 technical director and the instructor for Game Lab, which gives students the opportunity to develop nontraditional games, 鈥淲e wanted to open students鈥� eyes to the notion that the steps they鈥檙e learning about entertainment games directly apply to educational games.鈥�

As video games become more ingrained in American culture 鈥� 97 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds play video games, and Americans spent more than $15 billion on them in 2013, according to market information company NPD Group in its Games Market Dynamics report 鈥� businesses and the military have latched on to the technology as a motivational and training tool. 鈥淚t鈥檚 just a natural outgrowth that it would start spilling over into the educational field for kids,鈥� says Kent Gritton, co-founder of the Serious Games Showcase & Challenge, which recognizes educational game development.

Technology forecaster Daniel Burrus calls the 鈥済amification鈥� of education one of the 25 鈥済ame- changing hard trends that will create disruption and opportunity鈥� over the next five years. Popular games like 鈥淢inecraft鈥� have been modified for the classroom and used to teach everything from geometry to world cultures, while schools devoted to game-based learning, such as Quest to Learn in New York and the PlayMaker School in Los Angeles, have sprung up along the educational landscape. But significant game use remains the exception rather than the rule in American schools.

鈥淚f people are engaged, they鈥檙e more likely to learn,鈥� says Atsusi 鈥�2c鈥� Hirumi, 激情快播 associate professor of instructional technology and editor of Playing Games in School: Video Games and Simulations for Primary and Secondary Education. 鈥淚t makes sense to try to utilize [game] concepts to improve education,鈥� he says. 鈥淏ut if we want to make lasting significant changes, we have to reinvent the whole system.鈥�

激情快播 experts agree on the potential of gamification, a buzzword that vexes many game designers because it has come to mean everything from using game mechanics like leaderboards and badges in nongaming situations to the physical act of playing video games. But as scholars and producers ramp up their efforts to create and bring to market new educational games, the question on many of their minds is: Are schools going to level up with game-based learning, or will the trend eventually go the way of Atari?

Powering Up Education

Cuella has been entranced with video games since she discovered the role-playing game 鈥淜ingdom Hearts鈥� in fifth grade. Now she鈥檚 learning how to make her own games, but 鈥淐ompounded鈥� required a different mindset. Her team of eight classmates (four programmers, three producers and one artist) began with an ambitious list of the chemical compounds they wanted to include 鈥� from rocket fuel and Windex to glucose to make their animated character run faster 鈥� but had to scale back their ideas. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 know any kids who would remember that C6H1206 equals glucose,鈥� Cuella explains. Eventually, they settled for simpler compounds. Dealing with the factual demands of educational games can frustrate designers鈥� creative urges, Carbone says. But the most cutting-edge games manage to slip in educational content without being obvious. 鈥淟earning without trying to learn 鈥� that鈥檚 the highest-level goal,鈥� he says. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 more difficult than it sounds.鈥�

鈥淗ow do you present that content without breaking the flow of the game?鈥� asks Hirumi, who studies how to integrate games into the curriculum. 鈥淵ou can鈥檛 just say, 鈥榊ou鈥檝e finished your homework. You can go play this game.鈥� 鈥� This is the type of question he confronts with his work in the .

Hirumi鈥檚 students learn to collaborate effectively with game designers as part of their training. 鈥淚鈥檝e found that if game designers lead the game development process, the game can be fun, [but] not very effective educationally,鈥� he says, 鈥渁nd if instructional designers lead the game, it can be educational but not very entertaining.鈥� True collaboration brings the best results, but for this to happen, says Hirumi, 鈥淧eople have to come up with a viable business model to get companies to generate [educational] games that are fun, engaging and cost-effective.鈥�

While most FIEA students want to develop the kind of popular games their friends play, Carbone encourages them to consider alternative ways to use their degrees. 鈥淚t鈥檚 the difference between making a blockbuster and making an indie movie,鈥� he says, noting that careers in educational games can be good choices and involve fewer grueling hours. Still, it鈥檚 hard to ignore the economics of educational game design. 鈥淭he government isn鈥檛 paying Blizzard [Entertainment] millions of dollars to make 鈥楾he World of Chemistry.鈥欌��

Even if it did, most schools couldn鈥檛 keep up with the hardware needed to run games with the same level of sophistication many students play at home, Carbone says. 鈥淣ow our students鈥� bar for a good game is set by Xbox One or PlayStation 4.鈥�

Shawn Young, a Canadian high school teacher and creator of 鈥淐lasscraft,鈥� argues that it is possible to transform a classroom with gameplay using basic technology. In the program he created for his own physics classroom (and has so far sold to 3,500 other teachers in 75 countries), students take on the roles of warriors, healers or mages. They work together as teams, and gain or lose powers through their classroom behaviors, reaping real-life benefits, such as permission to eat in class, and consequences like detention. 鈥淐lasscraft鈥� requires only a single laptop and a projector; a basic version is available for free, and a premium version sells for $1 per student.

Although the education market can be difficult to break into, Young says, 鈥淐lasscraft鈥� helps address 鈥渉uman problems鈥� that concern educators, such as suspensions, fights and truancy. 鈥淲e have kids in really poor districts where just getting them to come to school is an issue,鈥� he adds. But for Detroit area teachers who have started using 鈥淐lasscraft,鈥� for example, Young says, 鈥淎ttendance has shot way up. Kids want to find out what the random event of the day is going to be. … All of a sudden we鈥檙e totally rewiring the social dynamics within the classroom.鈥�

League of Learners

Janis Cannon-Bowers and , co-directors and founders of 激情快播鈥檚 Recent and Emerging Technologies Research Organization (RETRO) Lab, use their expertise in psychology to develop video games and simulations for training and teaching. They鈥檝e found the military and business worlds to be more open to adopting these tools.

鈥淚n education, we have a distribution problem,鈥� Cannon-Bowers says. 鈥淗ow do you get these things into the hands of kids? [The problem is] partly cost, partly politics.鈥� With the strong focus on standardized test scores across Florida and the United States, schools 鈥渄on鈥檛 have the time to try something that might work,鈥� adds Bowers. 鈥淭here are not a lot of risk takers out there now. It鈥檚 almost a chicken-and-egg problem. [Schools] say, 鈥楶rove it works before I use it.鈥� Well, I can鈥檛 prove it works until you use it.鈥�

According to Hirumi, 鈥淵ou鈥檙e going to have your educational heroes who go above and beyond doing innovative things to make learning fun and engaging and productive, but in general, the way the system is designed really constrains innovation. If you change one aspect of the system, then you鈥檝e got to change other aspects 鈥� like curriculum, assessment and professional development 鈥� to support that change.鈥� Until the system changes, he expects only an incremental spread of gameplay in schools. These odds haven鈥檛 deterred Lucas鈥� Blair, 鈥�11, who used his experience working on games at RETRO Lab to co-found Little Bird Games with his wife Danielle 鈥–helles, 鈥�08. One of their recent projects, an educational e-book called The Lost Bee, has games built into the pages. As readers learn how honeybees create static electricity when they fly, helping them to collect pollen, they can play a game where they zip from flower to flower, trying not to bump into anything that makes the bees lose their static charge.

Besides designing educational games, Blair is even more excited about teaching students how to design their own games and simulations around a topic they鈥檙e studying. He also conducts game jams, which challenge teams of players to develop a game from scratch in a short period of time. According to Blair, this type of teaching encourages students to develop a sense of ownership about their learning, plus they gain experience working in teams and dealing with deadlines.

Another RETRO Lab alumnus, assistant professor at Peter Smith, 鈥�05, co-founded the Serious Games Showcase & Challenge (SGSC) 10 years ago to recognize games that promote learning, training or the greater good. More recently, SGSC organizers began offering Orange County (Florida) middle and high schools free access to the educational games selected as SGSC finalists. 鈥淲e put them right in the hands of the kids,鈥� Smith says. This year, Orange County student game-testers traveled back to the 19th century to seek freedom along the Underground Railroad, studied the effects of hurricane forces and learned about natural selection. Students evaluated the games and voted on their favorite, giving feedback to developers.

鈥淸Three years ago], when we started talking to educators, we realized that there wasn鈥檛 a lot of use of games in the schools,鈥� says Showcase co-founder Gritton. 鈥淭he administrators didn鈥檛 really understand how to bring them into the system … and the teachers themselves weren鈥檛 comfortable with how to integrate them into the curriculum and use them effectively for teaching and assessing students.鈥� Buoyed by recent success, SGSC organizers are trying to convince other area school districts to test the games. Partnering with schools has worked for game-makers in the Mixed Emerging Technology Integration Lab (METIL) at . Director David Metcalf has found most educators to be receptive. 鈥淵ou have to be full-service and talk to them about how it integrates into their curriculum and help them manage the program,鈥� he says.

In METIL鈥檚 鈥淪uper Nutrition!鈥� game, players must eat the right foods to collect energy to solve neighborhood missions and build their superpowers. Another, 鈥淢y Sports Pulse,鈥� challenges students to discover the importance of math and science in sports, solving problems sent to their smartphones. Middle school students who played the latter game showed a 16 percent increase in interest in math and science careers and a 10 percent increase in learning outcomes, according to one study.

While the initial run of 鈥淢y Sports Pulse鈥� only involved about 2,500 students, the sports agency Huddle Up Group plans to distribute the game across the country as part of a science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education program that brings NBA players and BMX athletes into schools to teach physics and engineering concepts. 鈥淭hat gives it a national footprint,鈥� Metcalf says.

RETRO Lab鈥檚 Cannon-Bowers thinks more support for educational games may emerge from the commercial sector 鈥� either from textbook makers wanting to stay relevant or from high-tech companies concerned about the STEM skills of their future workforce. METIL has found matching grants and corporate sponsorships for their educational games, and money raised through marathons and a benefit concert helped take 鈥淢y Sports Pulse鈥� to schools in Uganda and Haiti. 鈥淚t鈥檚 only as sustainable as the grants and sponsorships [we get], but it鈥檚 pretty sustainable,鈥� Metcalf says.

Winning the Game

When Cuella and her teammates at FIEA first began working on 鈥淐ompounded,鈥� they had a pipe dream of selling it on the Apple App Store. With the busy demands of grad school, she鈥檚 not sure how far they鈥檒l take it now. But she鈥檚 considering making educational games in the future to touch kids鈥� lives and change their attitudes toward school. 鈥淚 have a 13-year-old brother, and I know the struggle of getting him to learn something,鈥� she says. 鈥淓very time I ask him, he鈥檚 doing video games, not doing his homework.鈥�

鈥淭here鈥檚 no doubt in my mind we have to make education more engaging,鈥� says Hirumi. 鈥淗ollywood is going to continue, and the gaming industry is going to continue, and those are competitors for our children鈥檚 time.鈥�

While Gritton agrees that educational games will never approach the success of the entertainment industry, he believes their quality will keep improving as classrooms utilize more digital technology. 鈥淭his is how students think and learn,鈥� adds Metcalf, 鈥渁nd to put it in their language and their context is something that鈥檚 going to continue to happen, especially as more teachers have grown up learning with games.鈥�