Video Games vs. Conventional Education
April 17th, 2008This blog entry from a Chinese teacher offers some thoughtful ideas about how video games, which she calls a category of internet addiction (most gamers in China play online games, not console-based games), differ from conventional education.
Along with the customary points that video games offer immediate feedback and give many incentives for continued play through their structure of levels, opportunities to earn virtual money and ways to gain additional “powers,” she also points out that electronic games 1) allow unlimited attempts to pass a given level and 2) don’t stigmatize players for failure—”dying” doesn’t imprint on anyone’s mind (since the game has no mind) that a player is a weak performer, thereby prejudicing judgment of the player’s efforts on subsequent attempts.
Good points for teachers to remember.
April 17th, 2008 at 9:56 pm
Great link, thanks for sharing.
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May 21st, 2010 at 8:09 am
Video games don’t have that much of an effect as you say, there are some and in fact most games that teach the four basic school subjects such as: math, science, history, and english. I do agree that some games can’t teach kids that much but some fighting games can teach people alot and also show them what could happen. If the player knows its just a game then the games has no control over them, but if the player says its his/her “real” life then….well….they need some help. anyways I don’t agree with your point of the video game basically saying the player is weak. A person/player is only weak if their bond with both the real world and the video game world is off balance. The bond of the real world has to be equal to the video game world in order for the bond to stay balanced.