If I Kill Diablo, Can I Skip 4th Grade?

| | Comments (1)

So it's official now: the Federation of American Scientists has come out in favor of using video games for education. Who am I to argue with that?

The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars christened them "serious games" four years ago, mobilizing a loose-knit collection of game developers, educational foundations, grassroots organizations, human rights advocates, medical professionals, first responders, homeland security consultants, and assorted others around a common cause. Together--the experts provide the facts, the game developers the technological know-how--they've created a nascent industry. Their goal: To convince nonbelievers that games teach just as well as books, film, or any other medium.

"Games let us create representations of how things work in a medium that's built to do exactly that," says Ian Bogost, an assistant professor of digital media at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the author of Unit Operations: An Approach to Videogame Criticism. "If you want to explain how a nuclear power plant works in a textbook, you have to demonstrate it with a logical written argument. But with games, the player can literally interact with the model of how a system works."

They felt it was imporant enough to hold a Games Summit. No word on their vote for game of the year.


1 Comments

It's funny, I just recently read Steven Johnson's "Everything Bad Is Good For You" and now I see evidence for his arguments everywhere. His basic theme is that pop culture, including Video Games, TV, and the Internet, are actually making us smarter (despite all the hype about declining standards and setting new lows, etc...)

And those are pop culture games he's talking about, not "serious" games. Really, though, if they had a nuclear power plant game when I was in school, I'd have played it and probably learned a lot. At least, I would have done so if it was possible to induce a meltdown, create a nuclear bomb, or use radioactive waste as a coolant to see if I could get it to shoot out the towers, raining down sweet radioactive destruction on the town. *ahem* Was I still writing? Crap.

About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by Kevin Murphy published on October 26, 2006 12:16 PM.

A Little Management Wisdom was the previous entry in this blog.

Romney Sets A Reporter Straight is the next entry in this blog.

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.

LINKS


St. Louis Blogs:

J Bowen
Christopher Johnson
Charles Austin
Archpundit
Random Observations
Brian J Noggle
Shelley Powers
Gateway Pundit
Listless Lawyer
Jim Durbin
Timothy Birdnow
Diane Meyer
Marijean Jaggers
Scott Ginsberg
Steve Boriss
St. Louis Bloggers
St. Louis Blogs . Org
Randall Sherman
Urban Review STL

Missouri Blogs:

John Combest
Blue Girl, Red State
Another Rovian Conspiracy
The News Buckit
The Source
Fired Up! Missouri
Susan "Farmgirl"

Favorite Blogs:

James Lileks
Glenn Reynolds
Rich Galen
Megan McCardle
Scrapple Face
In The Agora
The Brothers Judd
Geitner Simmons
Cronaca
Science Blog
Winds of Change
Da Goddess
Justin Katz
Fran Mason
Phil Carter
Greg Costikyan
Tom McMahon
Kevin Aylward
Rand Simberg
Michael Totten
Belmont Club
News Busters
Mark Ciocco
David Weinberger
Tom Maguire
Jon Henke & McQ (plus Dale!)
Kevin Murphy The Other
Craig Henry
Brian Tiemann
Crooked Timber
Charles Johnson
Powerline
Busy Mom
Jason Van Steenwyk
Jenne
INDC Journal
Eamonn Fitzgerald
John Little
King of Fools
Perish the Thought
Patterico
Jeff Harrell
Michael Yon
Ed Driscoll
George Roper
Jeff Goldstein
Mark A. R. Kleiman
David Opderbeck
Libertas
Bob Somerby
Ben Witherington
Creative Bits
Mark Daniels
Michael Spencer
Think Sink
The Brussels Journal
A J Strata
S K Murphy
Joe Carter
John Hawkins
Bridget
Back Talk
Joe Sherlock
Mark Perry
Daniel Dilger

Pundits

Charles Le Kraut Martel
Victor Davis Hanson
Mark Steyn
Thomas Sowell
Malcolm Gladwell
Robert Cringely
John Carroll
Paul Graham
David Nicklaus

My Interests

The Paralyzed Veterans of America
The American Anti-Slavery Group
Wayside Gardens
The Alliance for the Separation of
School and State

MacSurfer Daily News
Urban Legends
Diablo II Net (Unofficial)
The Word Detective
HotAIR
UN Documentation Center
Cub Scout Pack 787
Baloo's Bugle (Cub Scouts)
Wounded Warrior Project
Operation Iraqi Freedom
Defense Industry Daily