I know there has been a lot of noise in the last few years about “gamification”. This is a way of learning by making it into a game. You play the game and learn at the same time.
Personally, having a lot of experience with video games, I think if you can somehow get kids to invest as much energy into useful games as they spend on purely recreational ones you could teach them a lot. I mean, this is all about engagement isn’t it?
I like where they are doing here and encourage you to watch the video showing how the game works. There will be more of this because 1. the cost (and difficulty) of making these games is dropping, and 2. there are more and more platforms (such as smartphones) that are capable of playing games. I can see a situation where kids learn how to code by playing games, and then create their own games… That would be awesome! It would be even more awesome if they can make their own Virtual Reality worlds like we saw in yesterday’s post. (see A Good Step Towards Virtual Reality)
- A video game that teaches how to program in Java | KurzweilAI
The researchers tested the game on a group of 40 girls, ages 10 to 12, who had never been exposed to programming before. In just one hour of play, the girls had mastered some of Java’s basic components and were able to use the language to create new ways of playing with the game.
The UC San Diego computer scientists plan to release the game for free and make it available to any educational institution that requests it. Researchers are currently conducting further case studies in San Diego elementary schools.
CodeSpells was influenced by research that Esper and Foster conducted on how successful programmers learn their trade. They surveyed 30 computer scientists and identified five characteristics that are key to learn programming outside a classroom setting: activities must be structured by the person who is trying to learn; learning must be creative and exploratory; programming is empowering; learners have difficulty stopping once they start; and learners spend countless hours on the activity.