What happens when digital games are introduced in classrooms

Dr Sarah Prestridge

School of Education and Professional Studies Mt Gravatt Campus Griffith University s.prestridge@griffith.edu,au

My research areas

Overview of Presentation •  Serious Play project

•  Focus on Teacher beliefs §  Teacher appropriation of digital games

§  Analysis tool for classifying beliefs and practices

•  Application to pre-service teachers

Serious Play •  Serious Play: Digital Games, Learning and Literacy for

twenty first century schooling. Funded by the Australian

Research Council, over a three-year period (2012-2015)

the project investigated what happened to literacy and

learning, curriculum, pedagogy and assessment when

digital games were introduced into schools.

Research Questions 1.  the ways in which students with widely differing preferences and experiences with digital

games and digital culture approached games-based teaching in the classroom; 2.  the ways in which the experience of game-play changed in classroom contexts; 3.  the ways teachers worked with digital games most effectively, and the kinds of pedagogical

practices and approaches that best capitalised on the capacities of games to teach; 4.  the opportunity games provided for creativity, production, and innovation; 5.  digital literacies and the ways in which learning through games challenged and extended

multimodal literacy learning; and 6.  an assessment framework which can be used to identify and support the multimodal

literacies and e-learning capabilities made possible through the use, analysis, and creation of digital games.

Research Questions 1.  the ways in which students with widely differing preferences and experiences with digital

games and digital culture approached games-based teaching in the classroom; 2.  the ways in which the experience of game-play changed in classroom contexts; 3.  the ways teachers worked with digital games most effectively, and the kinds of pedagogical

practices and approaches that best capitalised on the capacities of games to teach; 4.  the opportunity games provided for creativity, production, and innovation; 5.  digital literacies and the ways in which learning through games challenged and extended

multimodal literacy learning; and 6.  an assessment framework which can be used to identify and support the multimodal

literacies and e-learning capabilities made possible through the use, analysis, and creation of digital games.

Research Methodology •  Queensland and Victoria—and five primary

schools and five secondary schools. •  . The project games-based strands to guide

teachers’ integration: §  the use of ‘serious’ and commercial digital games

to support learning in the discipline areas; §  the critical analysis of digital games as text; §  the making of digital games to promote creativity.

A teacher’s appropriation of a digital game

Classifying teacher appropriation of digital games…..

thewaysteachersworkedwithdigitalgamesmosteffec3vely,andthekindsofpedagogicalprac3cesandapproachesthatbestcapitalisedonthecapaci3esofgamestoteach

Relationship between teacher beliefs and their practices with digital games

•  Epistemological beliefs

•  ICT Pedagogical beliefs

•  ICT Pedagogical practices

•  Student learning/outcomes

•  Teacher competency

Perry,W.(1970).FormsofIntellectualandEthicalDevelopmentintheCollegeYears:Ascheme.NewYork:Holt,RinehartandWinston.

DualisAc

MulAplisAc

RelaAvisAc

RelaAvism

right-or-wrongknowledgehandeddownbyauthority

mulApleviewsbutsAllbelievethatmostknowledgeiscertain

mostknowledgeastentaAveandcontextualandgeneratedbytheself;

thatknowledgeisuncertainandbasedontheweightofaccumulatedevidence

Epistemologicalbeliefs

ICT Pedagogical beliefs Computerskills

InformaAontool/supplementscurriculum

EnrichcurriculumFacilitatesemergingcurriculum

ICT Pedagogical practices

Kemmisetal1977&Ertmeretal2012

TeacherCentred Mix-Primarily Mix–Primary StudentCentred

Revelatory

Conjectualenablesstudentstomanipulateideasandhypothesestodevelopknowledge

Instruc2onal

Balanced

acAviAes/knowledgeinorderforstudentstodiscovertheconceptdividesthelearningacAviAesintosmallerunitswithuseofposiAve/negaAvefeedbackforcorrecAons

Student learning/outcomes

Teacher ICT competency •  Low

•  Medium

•  High

FrameTEP

Further information on FrameTEP •  Prestridge, S., & de Aldama, C. (2016). A Classification

Framework for Exploring Technology-Enabled Practice-

Frame TEP. Journal of Educational Computing Research,

0 (0) 1-21. DOI: 10.1177/0735633116636767

Lucy’s appropriation of digital games

Lucy’s appropriation of Reading Quest

Disruption:- At a critical point for change described

by Nespor (1987) as in a ‘Gestalt shift’

“This time I'd like to try a game that you suggest is

better for them”.

Minecraft –afternoon rotations

Minecon

Lucy states: I don't like to fail anything and I felt I didn’t do it right the first time. So I think it's allowing yourself to know less than the kids, and learn from them because I'm never going to be up with all of it anyway. I watch what they do. There'll be more and more games that I won't be interested in either, but as long as I can monitor it and keep an eye on them then I know that it's a good thing, then that's all good. I also think it's finding the right game that lends itself to lots of areas. I wouldn't have used the other game [Reading Quest] as often or as intensely I suppose. It wouldn't have been a huge part of what we did but this one, they just constantly talk about it, it drives me crazy.

Lucy’s appropriation of Minecraft

Jen’s appropriation of Ratchet and Clank The volume for these two boys - like they would be lucky to write half a page and you'd be lucky that it would make sense. Now they write up to two pages - and you can follow it - and that's a big thing for them. Because the picture is in their head, it's clearer - they can follow the story rather than making it up on their own and they follow the story and it gives them that sequence. So it's been good for them.

Jen’s appropriation of Ratchet and Clank

Jen’s appropriation of Temple Run IwasplayingTempleRunandIthoughtactuallythiscouldbeareallygoodthingbecauseitjusthappenssofast,kidscouldplayanduseshortsentenceslikeblah,blah,blah,andthenlonger,youknowmyheartpounded-addanextraclauseasIblah,blah,blah.SoI'mthinkingTempleRunasaninspiraIontoseeiftheycanapplyusingthoseshortsentencesfordramaIceffectandthenalsousingembeddedclausestowritesomethingabitbigger

Teacher lead on whiteboard ----paired task

Jen’s appropriation of Temple Run

To think about: •  Teachers initially chose a digital game that represented their

epistemological views and implemented using existing practices (Lucy- Reading Quest: Jen- Ratchet and Clank).

•  Triggers for changed occurred based on Student outcomes: §  Lucy – minecraft- change in beliefs & practice (to sandpit/concept application) §  Jen-Temple run (no change in practice- choosing skill based outcomes limited

appropriation) change in beliefs •  Low competency •  PD- metacognitive approach to teacher preparation and development

Serious play website

Thank you

Dr Sarah Prestridge

School of Education and Professional Studies Mt Gravatt Campus Griffith University s.prestridge@griffith.edu,au