Ask the Expert | James Paul Gee on video games and learning — from the NY Times Learning Network by Katherine Schulten
In this week’s New York Times Magazine article about video games in the classroom, Sara Corbett asks:
What if teachers gave up the vestiges of their educational past, threw away the worksheets, burned the canon and reconfigured the foundation upon which a century of learning has been built? What if we blurred the lines between academic subjects and reimagined the typical American classroom so that, at least in theory, it came to resemble a typical American living room or a child’s bedroom or even a child’s pocket, circa 2010 — if, in other words, the slipstream of broadband and always-on technology that fuels our world became the source and organizing principle of our children’s learning? What if, instead of seeing school the way we’ve known it, we saw it for what our children dreamed it might be: a big, delicious video game?
We’ve invited James Paul Gee, an expert on how video games fit within an overall theory of learning and literacy (and how they can help us in thinking about school reform), to take readers’ questions this week.
From DSC:
Be sure to check out the comments as well.