Promoting Adolescents’ Technological Literacy through Game Design in Gamestar Mechanic

Alex Games

Wed., June 09, 2:00–3:00, Old Madison

Since their inception, digital technologies have continuously influenced the way we participate in society, and 21st century social life is no exception (Waldrip-Fruin & Monfort, 2006). On one hand, these technologies today give a large number of people worldwide, unprecedented ability to access and disseminate information, allowing us to organize new forms of work, leisure, and civic participation. On the other hand, these transforming patterns place new demands on learners and workers in countries like the U.S., as the globalizing trends move standardized factory jobs overseas, and the well-paying jobs remaining require the ability to problem solve and innovate using digital technologies (Gee, Hull, & Lankshear,1996).

The need to prepare a technologically literate workforce capable to rigorously evaluating, understanding, and using technology in sophisticated and innovative endeavors (National Academy of Engineering, 2002) has been underscored by president Obama’s Educate to Innovate initiative, a call to action for industry and non-profits to create the learning programs of the future in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

This presentation concentrates on the results of a study of the development in certain areas of technological literacy by disadvantaged middle school children playing Gamestar Mechanic, a free access online role-playing game that uses a project-based curriculum to promote their adoption of the language, literacy, and thinking practices of game and interactive media designers (Games, 2010).

Design plays a central role in recent efforts to develop standards for the assessment of Technological Literacy, notably the Standards for Technological Literacy (International Technology Education Association, 2007), the National Educational Technology Standards (International Society for Technology in Education, 2007), and the proposed 2012 National Assessment of Educational Progress.

Using case studies (Stake, 1995) and discourse analysis (Gee, 2005), the study examined digital audio and video recordings of the game design practices of 12 children playing, repairing and constructing games within Gamestar Mechanic over a period of twelve weeks. Findings suggest that the game promoted the development of important technological literacy skills such as brainstorming, systems modeling, measurement, iterative testing and refinement, and algorithmic thinking, through design problems emerging from both curricular activities and player-initiated designs. However, they also suggest limitations of it’s purely game-based format in helping frame these skills in the context of understanding certain implications of technology (such as ethical and social ones). The session will conclude with a discussion of these strengths and limitations, and their implications for implementation within full technological literacy learning frameworks.

References

Games, I.A. (2010). Gamestar Mechanic: Learning a designer mindset through communicational competence with the language of games. To Appear in Learning, Technology and Media.

Gee, J. P., Hull, G. A., & Lankshear, C. (1996). The new work order: Behind the language of new capitalism. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press.

Gee, J.P. (2005). An introduction to discourse analysis. Abingdon, UK: Routledge.

International Society for Technology in Education (2007) National educational technology standards for students. Eugene, OR: ISTE