MOOC Learning Online - Week 3

The third week of my course Teaching Digital Literacy: Videogames in Education contains topics of literacy and learning.

The question I have found very interesting is about educational design of videogames, which answears Gee (2003) as follows:

The educational character of videogames is revolving around problem solving, critical thinking and word exploration. Next interesting field of education supported by videogames was coding and game development. Of course other layer of education is language learning (especially english as the languge of AAA videogame production). Because of languge barrier, there are many games and even truly educational games and software which will remain unavailable to players who can not speak the languge, or know the correct terminology around a specific subject or topic (especially science learning). Other learning might include building self-confidence, communication skills or learn to fell better (immersion and well-being tool). Beside language and communication is important the aspect of collaboration and building friendships. The one literacy or learning opportunity I would like to mention is technology or PC literacy, which is developed through videogames. For example, I have learn to add mods to some of my games to iclude other content to the game, which tought me how to search through files, instal programes etc.

While mentioning videogame museums, the librarian (or archival) question of videogame preservation came up to my mind. I am aware that Archive.org has some games emulated, as well as other software.

The 5C Model for teaching digital literacies

The five C's in this model stands for 5 how should an educator teach digital literacy, including:

1. Critical (the ability to analyse, interpret and ask questions)

2. Creative (the ability to design and create videogames)

3. Cultural (the opportunity to a wide range of videogames)

4. Collaborative (problem-solving or designing with others)

5. Computational (opportunities to think computationally)

"Our 5 C’s model highlights the types of engagement children need to have with digital technologies to develop their skills in reading and authoring digital texts. To develop digital literacies, children need opportunities to work collaboratively, to be critical, creative, and computational thinkers. Children also need access to new cultural experiences."

The creativity connected to videogaming experience can be seen in both inside the videogames (in gameplay) and in the game creation. The creativity should not be connected only to the artistic side of game, but also to gameplay and coding. There are some simple editors for creating videogames and we as educators must support children in their efforts -- in storytelling, but also artistic self-presentation, coding learning, interesting gameplay creation -- all throught videogames. I am a firm believer in the idea we should teach everyone coding, at least with assistation of an AI.

The 11 skills used as the foundation of our Early Coding Skills and Knowledge Framework are:

• Using directional language;

• Counting using ordinals;

• Understanding one-to-one correspondence;

• Identifying patterns;

• Creating and re-creating sequences;

• Giving and following directions;

• Understanding cause and effect;

• Defining algorithms;

• Decomposing;

• De-bugging; and

• Identifying loops.

The interesting was the maker mindset, cycle of look, think, make and test, which might help improve the students work.

During this week I have also noticed, that the usage of videogames in education came from understanding that videogames are part of children's life, their hobby and interest. Up until now, I have been purely focused on the videogames-format exploitation, rather than the understanding that it will be rather important to see videogames as value. This blindness probably occurs to me because for me videogames are hobby and value and I did not see that other educators might not know this matter of course.