Exercise 3.1: The battle for Wesnoth
The ‘learn-by-doing’ interactive tutorial was engaging and informative. I did run into problems on my mac however when I was asked to right-click and didn’t seem to be able to use ctrl to replicate this. This actually stopped me from being able to recruit additional fighters and I found myself on the losing end in my first battle with the Orcs!
Exercise 3.2: Mobile computing research
What is the educational value of online mobile games and mobile social network access?
Online mobile games and mobile social network access allow students to learn in more direct, engaging ways and access information in ways that are less abstract and more related true to their context.
Don Norman (2004, pp. 129-133) deals with the use of games for education in his book Emotional Design. He contrasts their traditional role of “mindless sport for teenage boys” with their 21st century potential for training and education. He also makes the point that games used to involve single individuals but more and more are involving “groups, sometimes scattered across the world. Communicating through computer networks.”
In their excellent literature review of games and learning, Kirriemuir & McFarlane (2004) argue that the current concept of “a sugar-coating fun” over educational material needs to give way to the design of educational games that offer the full engagement and sense of flow offered by today’s ‘non-educational’ computer games. As an interesting point on social networking, they bring attention to the fact that the proportion of female gamers is growing and this may be due to the increase in social gaming.
Eric Klopfer (2008) takes this a step further by applying these ideas specifically to the use of mobile devices in a classroom context. He argues that the mobile platform is ideal for learning games for all levels of education from primary school to university due to its portability, context sensitivity, connectivity and ubiquity.
A compelling example of the possibilities of of both mobile gaming and social networking for learning can best be seen in the new generation of augmented iPhone applications that are literally just being made available (officially available with iPhone OS 3.1 but available through Yelp as an Easter egg as of 26th Aug 2009). AcrossAir is a real application for teaching people about London’s underground that will be available soon (http://www.acrossair.com/apps_nearesttube.htm). Augmented ID is a concept video showing how social networking information might be integrated into augmented reality (http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/augmented_id_augmented_reality_facial_recognition.php).
Norman, D. A. (2004). Emotional Design. New York: Basic Books.
Klopfer, E. (2008). Augmented learning. The MIT Press.
Kirriemuir, J., & McFarlane, A. (2004). Literature Review in Games and Learning. FutureLab Series: Report 8.
Andy Wight's ITC510 Blog 