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.

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The type of learning materials that can be produced by an organization such as Virtual Heroes is the type/quality of material that will be produced in a vision that I have been calling “The Forthcoming Walmart of Education.”

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http://virtualheroes.com/index.asp

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Also see:

From DSC:
This is why I would encourage the U.S. government to see if they can get 1-2 billion — from the billionaires who are donating much of their wealth to charitable causes — in order to create such professionally-done, interactive, engaging, team-created learning materials.
Then make those materials available — free of charge — throughout the world.


How to teach with technology: Science and math — Edutopia.org

Also see:

Big Thinkers: Katie Salen on Learning with Games — Edutopia.org
A professor of design and technology at Parsons The New School for Design talks about the value of games and the empowerment of play.

How to Build a Technology-Based Curriculum — Edutopia.org
Educators emphasize that infrastructure must precede innovation.

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