March/April 2008

This month's "In the News" takes a look at two important new studies and how they relate to the LG2G digital learning game, Lure of the Labyrinth.

The Project Tomorrow Study… What Students Want.

A new study shows that most K-12 students want to use digital games to learn in the classroom, but that very few of their teachers are giving them the chance to do so. This is leading to increased student frustration and missed educational opportunities. 

More than 350,000 students, teachers, administrators and parents participated in the study, the 2007 Speak Up Survey, conducted by the group Project Tomorrow. One of the study’s key findings was that the majority of K-12 students would indeed like to see a greater use of digital games in their schools. This isn't really a surprise, given that the survey found that nearly two-thirds of K-12 students play digital games regularly and that they do so for about 8-10 hours per week. However, what is surprising is one of the students’ primary reasons for wanting games in the classroom - they believe that games can make it easier to understand challenging academic content. "Students are really articulating their interest in gaming," says Project Tomorrow chief executive Julie Evans, "as well as the many benefits educational gaming can provide, such as helping them to learn difficult math concepts."

Unfortunately, according to Evans, the education system is not yet taking advantage of this opportunity to engage students: the study found that only 11% of teachers are actually using digital games in their teaching. "The disconnect between what students want and what they're actually receiving is significant," she continues. "Of course, there have been huge investments in technology, educators are receiving more training and more policies are being implemented - but still, this student frustration is rising."

You can read the Speak Up Survey and learn more about Project Tomorrow at its website: http://www.tomorrow.org/index.html.

 

The National Mathematics Advisory Panel Study… What Students Need.

Another study was recently conducted for the U.S. Department of Education on the subject of how to improve mathematics education in this country. And its findings indicate that educators have a great deal of work to do if Americans are to remain competitive in the mathematics-intensive global workplace.

The study, done by the National Mathematics Advisory Panel (NMAP), does not specifically address the use of learning games, but it does provide recommendations that will be useful to all U.S. mathematics educators. Foremost among these recommendations is the idea that the K-8 mathematics curriculum must receive a substantial overhaul if students are to have later success in the essential subject of Algebra. According to the study, “the sharp falloff in mathematics achievement in the U.S. begins as students reach late middle school, where… Algebra course work begins.”

How does NMAP suggest the curriculum can be improved? “The mathematics curriculum in grades K-8 should be streamlined,” it says, “and emphasize a well-defined set of the most critical topics in the early grades.” NMAP recommends that teachers place more emphasis on helping students gain proficiency in what it defines as the Critical Foundations of Algebra: whole numbers, fractions and geometry and measurement. And it takes things further by recommending that teachers take a more integrated approach to teaching the various elements of mathematics. “Conceptual understanding, computational and procedural fluency and problem-solving skills are equally important and mutually reinforce each other,” the study states. “Debates regarding the relative importance of each of these components of mathematics are misguided.”

Finally, NMAP focuses on a subject that is sometimes overlooked in this kind of research: student effort. Mathematics, it seems, is an area where many people believe one is either inherently talented… or not. But according to the study, “a focus on the importance of effort in mathematics learning will improve outcomes. If children believe that their efforts will make them ‘smarter,’ they show greater persistence in mathematics learning.”

Visit http://www.ed.gov/about/bdscomm/list/mathpanel/index.html to read the entire NMAP report and explore more of its findings.

 

Lure of the Labyrinth Gives Students What They Want and What They Need.

So what do these two studies mean for the LG2G game, Lure of the Labyrinth? Well, with apologies to the Rolling Stones, we think they mean our game will give students what they want… and what they need.

How so? Well….

• By simple virtue of being a digital learning game (and a cool one at that), Lure of the Labyrinth will give students exactly what they’re asking for in the Project Tomorrow study. And as a major bonus, Lure of the Labyrinth’s gameplay is explicitly designed to make potentially challenging pre-algebra content more accessible to students who might otherwise have difficulty with it.
• Many of Lure of the Labyrinth’s game puzzles focus on the exact topics that NMAP identified as its Critical Foundations of Algebra: whole numbers, fractions and geometry and measurement.
• Lure of the Labyrinth’s gameplay promotes the integrated experience of math learning advocated in the NMAP report. As students move through Lure of the Labyrinth, they use their new understanding of pre-algebra concepts to practice mathematical computations that help them solve puzzles and succeed in the game.
• Student effort is always rewarded in Lure of the Labyrinth. Players gain points for trying to solve the game puzzles, even if they’re not successful. And that keeps their effort level high, meaning that, as per the NMAP report, they’re more likely to actually learn the pre-algebra content of the game.

In short, these two new reports happily support almost everything that we’ve built into Lure of the Labyrinth.

We can’t wait to share it with you… and it won’t be much longer now.

 

Game Playing on the Nintendo DS Boosts Scottish School Children

A daily round of digital game play on the Nintendo DS seems to have improved math performance, behavior and concentration among a group of Scottish students at St. Columba’s primary school in Dundee, Scotland.

The game play was part of a study by the group Learning and Teaching Scotland (LTS) and involved having students play “More Brain Training from Dr. Kawashima” on the popular Nintendo handheld for 20 minutes at the start of each school day. After ten weeks of this happy regimen, the students showed substantial advances in their math skills, both in terms of their ability to get correct answers and the speed with which they did so. As an added benefit, the school’s teachers even noticed marked improvement in the students’ behavior and focus in the classroom.

Derek Robertson of LTS felt that the correlation between game play and the students’ enhanced performance was undeniable. “We need to look at the educational experience of learners who are coming from a digital age, who have a cultural value of technology, of games,” he said. “It’s important that school reflects this as well and that teachers can use this innovatively and effectively to engage those who may be disaffected.”

Other Scottish educators disagreed with Robertson on the value of games. “I think they’re just games,” said Robert Logie, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at Edinburgh University. “They can be fun to play, but I think focusing too much on this as a sort of catch-all cure for what people see as a lack of mental ability is misleading.”

Nonetheless, LTS is going to get the chance to test its ideas (and its findings) further, as it’s now extending its gaming study to include more than 900 students in 32 primary schools around Scotland. You can learn more about the study and about LTS in this BBC story and at LTS’ website.

 

$50 Handhelds Help Teach Kids Reading and Math

A new, extremely cheap handheld that teaches reading and math is being hailed as a great success based on a Chicago pilot program with K-2 students.

The device is called the Teachermate and it was invented by the Chicago nonprofit Innovations for Learning. The Teachermate is light, portable, designed for the small fingers of young children, and it only costs $50 per unit. The device includes reading and math software that was also created by Innovations for Learning. And it was built because the company was finding it difficult to actually get its software into the hands of school children. “Our organization had been stymied over the years by the same roadblock faced by all educational software makers – the inadequacy of personal computers in K-2 classrooms,” explains company Executive Director Seth Weinberger. “Public schools do not have the funds to provide sufficient computer resources to the young students who need them most.”

Innovations for Learning is currently in the process of supplying Teachermates to at least one classroom in every one of Chicago’s 500 elementary schools. And so far, the results have been excellent. “The Teachermate handheld computer is one of the most promising new educational tools I have seen,” says Sharnell Jackson, the Chief E-Learning Officer of the Chicago public schools. “Not only is the cost of each unit low enough to be affordable for every student in a classroom, but the device is easy to use, easy to train and easy to maintain.” And teachers are pretty excited about the new handheld, too. “The Teachermate system definitely enhances students’ reading skills,” according to Chicago first-grade teacher Martha Arriaga. “If the students could use these devices all day long, they would. It gets them focused on what they should be learning, but they think they are just playing games.”

And now the Teachermate is reaching beyond the Chicago schools, as it’s being piloted in schools in New York, Detroit, New Orleans, San Antonio, Phoenix and Denver.

If you’d like to learn more about the Teachermate, check out the Innovations for Learning site.

 

University To Give Students iPhones and iPods for Learning

Every college freshman in America probably wants an iPhone or iPod (that is, if they don’t already have one). Now thanks to a new program at Texas-based Abilene Christian University (ACU), a group of lucky freshmen are getting these devices - for free – to help promote learning and staying connected in their college community.

The university recently announced plans to give all of this fall’s incoming freshmen either an iPhone or an iPod Touch as part of its six-year study on mobile computing in education. ACU is also providing students with free internet service so they’ll be able to access the web with these devices. And while the university acknowledges that students may occasionally use their iPhones and iPods for entertainment purposes, ACU’s Chief Information Officer states that “The lead issue is that this is a learning initiative.”

What kind of learning is involved? Well, ACU freshmen will be able to use their iPhones and iPods to receive homework alerts, answer classroom surveys and quizzes, download course syllabi, change course enrollments, listen to lecture podcasts, participate in discussion groups and even get directions around the campus. And the university is currently working on developing even more applications for the devices. “This is exciting to me,” says ACU provost Dr. Dwayne VanRheenen, “not only because we’re giving students new tools, but because we are transforming the learning environment. The extensive research that’s been done on campus in the past 10 months has prepared us to launch with freshmen this fall, and research will be ongoing as we expand the program in the future.”

Find out more about the Abilene Christian and mobile learning at http://www.acu.edu/technology/mobilelearning/index.html.

 

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