Gaming in Education: What Students Can Learn From Video Games in School
As new teachers enter the workforce with greater technology familiarity than their predecessors, a wider margin of accepted teaching methods has developed, changing the way in which educators are able to form successful instructional relationships with their students. Many districts, in order to help faculty keep pace with their rapidly changing and technologically capable student bodies, are attempting to alter their most well established modes of erudition (namely lecture, discussion, co-operative group, and hands-on learning); as a result, there has been a continuing trend in the reduction of teacher reliance on textbooks and an upswing in the incorporation of classroom media across all levels of the education system. These changes, primarily serving to accommodate the vast increase in computer reliance for day-to-day tasks and the need for students to develop team-based collaboration skills, have led educators to begin more deeply investigating the potential benefits of video game-based pedagogy. Games, unlike textbooks and more traditional forms of direct instruction, may more thoroughly afford students the opportunity to integrate their learning of subject matter with the 21st century leadership skills necessary for success in academia, law, the armed forces, and private industry.
However, as video games are examined with increased scrutiny, there remains little consensus on the benefits and detriments of applying them to the classroom environment. In some circles, games are seen not only as a useful tool in encouraging student motivation to learn outside of the academic environment (Coller & Scott, 2009), but also as a means to increase student engagement during in-class learning sessions (Annetta et al, 2009), foster valuable skills with respect to finite tasks or jobs (Duque et al, 2008; Coller & Scott, 2009; de Freitas & Griffiths, 2007), and improve upon