Week 7 response

This week’s readings emphasized the important difference between thoughtful, well-designed learning games and ineffective games. I figured that Zhang was talking about Coolmath before she even named it because of that site’s reputation for shallow math games. I hope that Zhang’s study is not understood to mean that math games are ineffective. Berkowitz et al and the Devlin video both show how well-constructed games can measurably improve performance. The latter portions of Zhang, where she discussed how students in lower-performing states played more Coolmath, conjured the possibility in my mind that teachers and parents in those states might be directing their kids to Coolmath by a simplistic assumption that those math games will mechanistically boost math scores, and using the games as a replacement for more rigorous lessons.

 

Parents and teachers should be able to distinguish between good games and ineffective ones, as well as how to properly integrate such games as a part of their students’ academic diet. It is not enough for some ed-tech designers to know good practices for educational games. If those quality games are indistinguishable in the app store from lower-quality games, this barely helps the student population writ large. Perhaps there could be some sort of certification board, like the ESRB or MPAA, that could review and certify research-backed educational games?