Natalia Sinitskaya Ronda

Computer game development as a literacy activity

This study examined computer game development as a pedagogical activity to motivate and engage students in curriculum-related literacy activities. We hypothesized that as a consequence, students would improve their traditional reading and writing skills as well as develop new digital literacy skills. Eighteen classes of grade 4 students were assigned to either an experimental or control group. Both groups studied the same curriculum unit over a 10week period, however, in addition the experimental group developed computer games related to the unit using a game development shell. An analysis of pre- and post-unit scores on two standardized literacy test batteries revealed that the experimental students performed significantly better on one of the subtests, a measure of logical sentence construction (p=.002). Field notes and teacher interview data indicated that game development helped improve student content retention, ability to compare and contrast information presented, utilize more and different kinds of research materials including digital resources, editing skills, and develop an insight into questioning skills.

Gaming geography: Educational games and literacy development in the Grade 4 classroom

This paper outlines a case study conducted in two public schools in the greater Toronto area as a complementary component of a multisite experimental study exploring educational game development as a learning activity for motivating and engaging students in curriculum-related literacy activities (Owston et al., 2007). Researchers studied children creating and playing four online board games based on grade 4 geography content, viz., Tic-tac-toe, Trivial Pursuit, Snakes and Ladders, and Mother Goose. The schools shared similar positive orientations to technologically focused learning and good technological resources, but they had different institutional histories of implementing computers in curricular learning. Technological equipment was approached, accessed and utilized quite differently in each class, affecting pedagogical practices and learning experiences. Though improvements to traditional literacy learning were found to be limited to improved logical sentence structure (Owston et al., 2007), game development did allow students to build digital literacy skills, including computer literacy and typing skills. Moreover, the project enabled participating teachers to think about profitably incorporating online board game production in broad-based curricular learning. Resume : Cet article presente une etude de cas menee dans deux ecoles publiques de la grande region de Toronto en complement d’une etude experimentale multisite visant a explorer la conception de jeux educatifs en tant qu’activite d’apprentissage pour stimuler la motivation et l’engagement des eleves dans des activites de lecture et d’ecriture liees au curriculum (Owston et al., 2007). Les chercheurs ont etudie les enfants lors de la creation puis de l’utilisation de quatre jeux de plateau en ligne axes sur la matiere de 4e annee en geographie. Les eleves ont realise une version des jeux de Tic-Tac-Toe, de Quelques arpents de pieges, de Serpents et echelles et de Ma mere l’Oie. Les ecoles partageaient les memes orientations positives en faveur de l’apprentissage axe sur la technologie et l’utilisation de bonnes ressources technologiques, mais elles differaient quant a leurs antecedents institutionnels de mise en œuvre de l’utilisation des ordinateurs dans l’apprentissage du curriculum. L’approche adoptee, l’acces a l’equipement technologique ainsi que son utilisation variaient de maniere significative selon les classes, ce qui a influence les pratiques pedagogiques et les experiences d’apprentissage. Malgre le fait que les ameliorations observees par rapport a l’apprentissage de la lecture et de l’ecriture au moyen de methodes traditionnelles se soient limitees a l’amelioration des structures de phrase logiques (Owston et al., 2007), la creation de jeux a permis aux eleves d’acquerir des competences en litteratie numerique, y compris des connaissances en informatique et en dactylographie. En outre, le projet a permis aux enseignants participants de reflechir a la possibilite d’integrer de maniere profitable la creation de jeux de plateau en ligne au sein de l’apprentissage du curriculum en general.