Winter 2006

The ICT agenda

Literacy, learning and video games

Popular culture often organises learning for problem-solving and for language and literacy in deep and effective ways. Here, James Paul Gee looks at some of the learning principles built into the design of good video games.

I started my career as a linguist with no interest in education but eventually moved on to be captivated by the role of language in learning and schooling. As I worked on issues of language and literacy, paying special attention to the ways in which schools often failed poor and minority children and their families, I certainly never imagined the day when I would play video games, let alone argue they are good for learning and for language and literacy development.

I played my first adult video game only four years ago, inspired to do so by watching my then six-year-old play Pajama Sam. Since then, I have become convinced that good video games can teach us much about how to reform learning not only in schools, but for adult learning as well. Indeed, video games are becoming a popular platform for learning, not only for children, but in the military and in workplaces as well (see www.seriousgames.org). However, the real message we should take from good video games is not necessarily to use games for

learning, though that is a fine thing, but to use the sorts of learning principles that good games incorporate in our curriculums, whether a game is involved or not.

The language of good games

Popular culture is more complex today than ever before and part of this complexity involves language. Given that one of the biggest predictors of children’s school success is the size of their early vocabularies, it is interesting to look at a typical description of a Pokémon—little ‘pocket monsters’ featured in video games, cards, books, movies, and television shows:

‘Bulbasaur are a combination of Grass-type and Poison-type Pokémon. Because they are Grass-type Pokémon, Bulbasaur have plant-like characteristics such as the large, leafy growth on their backs. Over time, Bulbasaur will evolve into Ivysaur and Venusaur.’

Lots of low frequency words are used here, complex syntax as well. Children as young as six play Pokémon without any socio-economic equity divides in terms of skill or interest. Yu-Gi-Oh, another popular game (cards and video games) involves yet more complicated language.

The structure

Today’s popular culture often organises learning for problem-solving and for language and literacy in deep and effective ways. Take, for example, good video games like Rise of Nations, Age of Mythology, Deus Ex, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, and Tony Hawk’s Underground. Such games, first of all, offer players strong identities. Learning a new domain, whether biology or urban planning, requires learning to see and value work and the world in new ways, in the ways in which biologists or urban planners do.

In video games, players learn to view the virtual world through the eyes and values of a distinctive identity (such as Solid Snake in Metal Gear Solid) or one they have built from the ground up (as in The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind). It is a pity we have built so few games centered on identities relevant to school and the world of work.

The principles

Good games are built on a cycle of hypothesise, probe the world, get a reaction, reflect on the results, re-probe to get better results—a cycle typical of experimental science and of reflective practice.

Good games let players be producers, not just consumers. An open-ended game such as The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind is a different game for each player. Players co-design the game through their unique actions and decisions. At another level, many games come with software through which players can modify (‘mod’) them, producing new scenarios or whole new games (such as new skate parks in the Tony Hawk games).

Good games lower the consequences of failure. When players fail, they can start from their last saved game. Players are encouraged to take risks, explore, and try new things.

Good games allow players to customise the game to fit their learning and playing styles. Games often have different difficulty levels and good games allow problems to be solved in multiple ways.

Thanks to all of these features, players feel a real sense of agency, ownership, and control. It’s their game.

But learning goes yet deeper in good games. In good video games, problems are well-ordered so that earlier ones lead to hypotheses that work well for later, harder problems.

Good games offer players a set of challenging problems and then let them practise these until they have achieved mastery. Then the game throws a new class of problem at the player (sometimes called a ‘boss’), requiring them to rethink their taken-for-granted mastery. In turn, this new mastery is consolidated through repetition (with variation), only to be challenged again. This cycle of consolidation and challenge is the basis for the development of expertise in any domain. Good games stay within, but at the outer edge, of the player’s ‘regime of competence’. That is, they feel ‘doable’ but challenging. This makes them pleasantly frustrating—a flow state for human beings.

Good games encourage players to think about relationships, not isolated events, facts and skills. In a game such as Rise of Nations, players need to consider how each action they take might affect their future actions and the actions of the others playing against them as they each move their civilisations through the ages.

Good video games operate on a principle of performance before competence. Players can perform before they are competent, supported by the design of the game, the ‘smart tools’ the game offers and, often, other more advanced players (in the game or in chat rooms).

Good games recruit ‘smart tools’, distributed knowledge and cross-functional teams just like modern high-tech workplaces. The virtual characters manipulated in a game are ‘smart tools’. They have skills and knowledge of their own, which they lend to the player. For example, the citizens in Rise of Nations know how to build cities, but the player needs to know where to build them. A multi-player game such as World of WarCraft has teams of players with different skills. A Mage plays differently from a Warrior, so each player must master a specialty, but must also understand enough about the other specialised skill sets to coordinate with other team members. Thus, the core knowledge needed to play video games is distributed among a set of real people and their ‘smart tools’, much as in a modern science lab or high-tech workplace.

The learning

Let’s return a moment to language and literacy. People are poor at dealing with words out of context. Games almost always give verbal information ‘just in time’ (when players need and can use it) or ‘on demand’ (when the player asks for it).

Research suggests that people really know what words mean only when they can hook those words to experiences; that is, to the sorts of actions, images, or dialogues to which the words relate. Games always situate (show) the meanings of words and show how they vary across different actions, images and dialogues. They do not just offer words for words (definitions). Games give words situated meanings, not just verbal ones.

The learning features in good video games are well-supported by research in the learning sciences. All of them should be present in all learning, whether a game is used or not.

References

di Sessa, A A (2000). Changing Minds: Computers, learning, and literacy, MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Gee, J P (2003). What Video Games Have to Teach Us about Learning and Literacy, Palgrave/Macmillan, New York.

Schon, D A (1991). The Reflective Turn: Case studies in and on educational practice, Teachers College Press, New York.

Shaffer, D W (2005). ‘Epistemic Games’, Innovate 1.6, available at www.innovateonline.info/index.php?view=article&id=79

James Paul Gee is the Tashia Morgridge professor of reading at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA.

The author owns the copyright in this article. For information related to the reuse of this work in any form please contact the publisher denise.quinn@curriculum.edu.au