EDU625: Blog 2
- Rosa Conti
- Nov 27, 2022
- 9 min read
Updated: Nov 28, 2022
Integrating Technology into Learning: A 3-Part Reflection Series
In this course, I am exploring ways that technology can be used to create valuable learning experiences. Part 2 of this blog series offers my impressions and insights from the fourth and fifth units of this module.
KEY ISSUES + CONCEPTS
Do you remember the first time you were impressed with a speaker or presentation? For me, it was twenty-two years ago at the first conference I attended called Results 2000: Create an Extraordinary Life, produced by the great Tony Robbins. When Tony came on stage, he was like nothing my young impressionable mind had ever seen.
I don’t think I heard much of what was said for the rest of the event because I was too entranced in analyzing Tony’s self-composure and command over his voice and expression. His presence was dynamic, his words powerful, his energy extraordinary. Saying I was mesmerized is an understatement, for I have spent the last two decades attending workshops, reading, and studying others in the quest for understanding the soul and science that becomes the art of exceptional storytelling and presentations. In fact, I still have the souvenir program from that day.
It was a natural trajectory that my undergraduate degree was in Communications and Media Studies, and I am currently pursuing an M.Ed. in Educational Technology. You might question the “connection” between my emotional effect that day seeing Tony Robbins in New Haven Coliseum, communication, technology, and education: it all ties together in the quest of knowing how to reach others. Whether it is to communicate, entertain, persuade, or educate, there are ingredients of best practices and lessons learned that, when joined together, create recipes that help us to bridge the gap between what we have to share and how we get others to listen (or learn).
Therefore, studying the topics of storytelling and gameplay in learning in Weeks 4 and 5 of this course was exciting.
PRINCIPLES OF EFFECTIVE DIGITAL PRESENTATIONS
There are countless studies and literature on what makes effective presentations, especially considering that the mediums have changed over time. In contemporary times alone, we watched the evolution of overheard projectors to digital presentation software in the six years between 1982 and 1987 (Brock, 2019). While we tend to think of the ubiquitous PowerPoint when hearing "presentation software," there are many other digital solutions to choose from when wanting to deliver a message or educational training. However, this article will not cover what medium to choose. Rather, we will discuss best practices to consider in designing an effective, well-crafted digital presentation intended for student learning.
Gone are the days of conference rooms that held a captive audience. Today, if digital presentations are not attractive, exciting enough, or easy to grasp, we risk the learner leaving or losing concentration. In either case, the learner loses. Communicators and educators are greatly advantaged today to live in the digital era. There is no shortage of ideas or digital assets to reach learners and captivate their minds.
This EDU625 course helped underscore my belief that to help spark and keep students' engagement, digital creators should seek to include the following aspects in learning presentations.
Storytelling – We remember stories, not isolated facts. Stories help create context and emotional connection and support connectivism, which develops a deeper understanding of how ideas are connected and why they are essential (Wharton Interactive, 2020). For example, to demonstrate the importance of mathematics, an instructor might reference the actual story (or show the movie Hidden Figures) of three women at NASA who provided the calculations needed to bring astronauts home safely during the early years of the U.S. space program.
Gameplay – There is an abundance of benefits from including interactive gameplay in learning, which is explored further below.
Interaction – Creating learning activities that require student interaction sharpens critical thinking skills and teaches children how to collaborate and work successfully in groups (Scholastic, n.d.). For example, passing a ball around as a “talking stick” can help young learners understand the value of respect and listening skills.
Make it personal – According to Horton (2012), Connect activities help students connect what is being taught and what is already known. Students become immersed in learning activities when they see themselves in them. For example, asking pondering questions, such as, “Where do you think this can be useful in your life?” or “Can you think of any way this can be improved?” can invite students to see real-life value and connections. Read my blog on Connecting and Assessing e-Learner Knowledge.
Multimedia – Visuals can make a concept, context, or theory more understandable. I could only have gotten through two required undergraduate math courses because of the interactive, guided sandbox that helped me to understand the concepts. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and images, embedded videos, and narration can create cohesiveness between thoughts, complicated topics, or dense detail. Reading or listening can be dry without visuals to keep learners’ attention. Adding background music to a digital presentation can provoke energy and help students absorb and interpret new information more easily (Raypole, 2022). Read my blog on the importance of digital media.
In this video, I discuss the purpose and benefits of digital multimedia.
On the other hand, it also benefits students to step out from in front of the camera and look through the lens. For example, when students are asked to prepare a digital story of their own, it allows them to “find meaning, point of view, or emotional connections" (Frazel, 2010), which also notably supports the learning process. Giving students an assignment to create and deliver a presentation will help them explore their creativity, innovation, and personality. The script-writing aspect of it also strengthens language arts skills (Denby, 2020).
GAMES IN LEARNING
Did you know that as of September 1, 2021, China barred anyone under 18 from playing online video games during the week and limited their play to only three hours on most weekends (CNN, 2021)? Many Chinese parents believe their teenagers are addicted to online games, which “seriously affected their studies and physical and mental health” (CNN, 2021, para. 7).
However, China is an anomaly to how most of the world has begun viewing online gaming, especially in education. One reason is that gameplay in education provides experiential learning and allows players to learn by failing safely. For example, Harvard’s Graduate School of Education echoes what many are coming to know: games designed for learning can spark intrinsic motivation and genuine engagement and actually help students to learn better (Thomas, 2021).
Unlike a grading or testing scenario where students feel vulnerable, when learning games are designed right, they actually maximize learning. This happens because when one is interested and cares about a topic, they are curious and engaged, which keeps them on task to keep at it. In other words, because students aren’t being tested or hawked over during the trial-and-error moments of learning, they expect they will have to try again until they succeed.
Other soft skills and cognitive benefits come from gameplay learning (GBL). For example, while some may consider games antisocial, according to Mastery Coding (Conti et al., 2021), GBL demands cooperation and communication and leads to emotional and intellectual growth. When game designers can create games in such a way that they become “sticky” to a learner’s brain (for instance, by framing it around a storyline that pulls the student in), this keeps them thinking about the game after they step away from it, which encourages critical thinking skills.
An excellent measure stick that instructors can use to gauge learning success in GBL is Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy. Here, instructors can witness students climbing the ladder of this framework when they can remember, understand, apply, analyze, and evaluate what they learn in gameplay, eventually reaching the creation stage by producing their own new or original game.
This video discusses how the popular game Pokemon uses critical skills to move children up the ladder of Bloom's Taxonomy.
MY OVERALL EXPERIENCE + OBSERVATIONS
My overall experiences these last two weeks have been very positive, even though the learning challenges took many hours, namely making a narrated video in Unit 4 and looking for an online game maker to make my own in Unit 5. The trajectory of this course slows down in my mind when I fall into rabbit holes with projects like these (that take so much time), but I feel amazing when I push past the hump and create work I'm proud of, and stretch my learning, adding to my cognitive and skill-based toolboxes.
I had several key takeaways when studying storytelling and gameplay in education.
First, the benefits of storytelling and principles of gameplay apply not only to children but to adults too. For example, when I took two math courses for my undergraduate degree, I would not have succeeded as well as I did without the help of an integrated learning tool that provided storyline examples to keep me interested. It also had a "Show Me" feature where the learner could get more help, which I now recognize is like Gee's Sandbox Principle (Thorn, 2013), where I felt safe to test my knowledge before taking the weekly tests. I see now that this math tool had many other of Gee's principles. Problems were "well-ordered," "naturally falling into one another, and it involved "systems thinking," where I was able to see the bigger picture, helping me to see how the pieces all fit together (Buckle, 2020).
Second, I learned that one could build a storyline around almost anything. For example, I created an e-Learning course, PowerPoint Basics in Storyline, where learners are introduced to a protagonist (Alex, 15) who wants to learn PowerPoint to earn money to buy a car. The course taught learners how to use this program by "following along" with Alex's journey. I didn't know when I designed this that I included a gamification element. I learned this later, and this EDU624 course helped underline this finding.
Next, I felt excited to learn that many, if not all, of James Gee's gaming principles can apply to real-life, non-gaming environments, too. I saw my own behavior, habits, and preferences in so many of Gee's ideas. In other words, the principles that Gee identified for gameplay in education also firmly apply to areas of my self-growth and work ethic. Gee says that good GBL builds a sense of agency and self-empowerment and requires one to rethink their knowledge to connect old and new. Gee also notes that GBL should be "pleasantly frustrating" enough to challenge and intrigue but easy enough to believe one can overcome the problems faced (Buckle, 2020). Aren't these principles, in many ways, ones that also help us succeed in other areas of our lives? I believe so. Therefore, the believability of these concepts in education holds up even stronger.
Lastly, I am continuing to discover how to apply educational technology to the corporate workforce. Because the learning mind operates much in the same way in adults compared to kids – albeit the constructivism is further developed in the former – I realized that learning content could be applied to any platform. For example, when I was challenged in Unit 4 to create a presentation-based learning activity, I chose a topic that interests me: good study habits. Why can't I also use this narrated, background music approach with my colleagues on work-related issues, given time? Likewise, when, in Unit 5, I needed to create a simple game that could be used to teach a learning concept, in under an hour, I made a "matching game" in Nearpod. I am sure this framework can also be used in some fun way to deliver and drive home communication messages.
My biggest challenge over the last two weeks was in Unit 5 when I had to find a "simple game" online to perform my learning challenge. The examples provided by the school could have fared better; none appeared intuitive, and all took too long to figure out for this mini-assignment. I was relieved to discover Nearpod from an online search.
QUESTIONS
A few questions arose for me over the last two weeks.
As gameplay and gamification make their way more predominantly into classrooms, how might this affect the training and education required of our instructors? Will it push out teachers who cannot (or are not willing to) grasp technology? Will a teacher shortage occur? Will it inspire others (like me) who are more interested in being a "guide on the side" versus a "sage on the stage" (Stanton, 2019) to join the academic teaching world?
Will game-based learning be able to (now or in the future) accommodate students with learning challenges?
Piaget’s theory suggests that a child’s intelligence grows and develops by existing in the world. Therefore, if gameplay and technology become the prevalent mode of learning, how will this affect early learners whose cognitive schemas, perceptions, and understanding will have no other outside context or societal reasoning than in front of a screen?
CONCLUSIONS
In closing, storytelling and games are similar in that they put the learner in the role of the protagonist. Storytelling is an excellent framework for positioning the learner (protagonist) to care about and to create a “why” they want to learn. It triggers their initial interest. Gameplay in learning amplifies the journey for students. When the benefits of educational storytelling and gameplay are combined, it’s clear how they complement each other and why these two disciplines were married together in this EDU625 course.
In this video, a 2011 Montana Teacher of the Year explains how he uses game design elements to improve learning in his high school AP Biology classroom.
References
Brock, D. (2019, October 8). Slide logic: The emergence of presentation software and the prehistory of PowerPoint. CHM. https://computerhistory.org/blog/slide-logic-the-emergence-of-presentation-software-and-the-prehistory-of-powerpoint
Buckel, L. (2020, December 1). James Gee's principles for game based learning. Legends of Learning. https://www.legendsoflearning.com/blog/james-paul-gee-game-based-learning/
Denby, J. (2020, November 18). 5 reasons multimedia presentations are a classroom must. Common Sense Education. https://www.commonsense.org/education/articles/5-reasons-multimedia-presentations-are-a-classroom-must
Frazel, M. (2010). Digital storytelling guide for educators. ISTE.
Horton, W. (2012). E-Learning by design. (2nd ed.). John Wiley & Sons.
CNN. (2021, August 31). China bans kids from playing online video games during the week. https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/31/tech/china-ban-video-games-minor-intl-hnk
Conti, R., Levey, A., Smith, D., & Sitomer, A. (2021, September). Academic Esports Whitepaper: Benefits of competitive gaming. Mastery Coding. https://www.masterycoding.com/esports/academic-esports-whitepaper
Raypole, C. (2022, June 22). Music and Studying: It’s Complicated. Healthline. https://www.healthline.com/health/does-music-help-you-study
Scholastic. (n.d.). Understanding interactive learning. https://www.scholastic.com/parents/family-life/social-emotional-learning/technology-and-kids/understanding-interactive-learning.html
Stanton, P. (2019, August 17). “Sage on the stage” vs. “guide on the side” education philosophy. Medium. https://peterwstanton.medium.com/sage-on-the-stage-vs-guide-on-the-side-education-philosophy-f065bebf36cf
Thomas, A. (2021, September 6). 5 reasons video games should be more widely used in school. Harvard Graduate School of Education. https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/uk/21/06/find-fun
Wharton Interactive. (2020, June). The value of storytelling in learning. https://interactive.wharton.upenn.edu/learning-insights/value-storytelling-learning
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