I interviewed two high school gamers this week, asking them the following questions:
A - high school senior (female)
B - high school senior (male)
1. What is the atmosphere like when you first join a game?
A- I was a little young, and inexperienced, it was not friendly and I was asked to leave in not a nice way.
B - Friendly, cooperative
2. How do you find a team/guild?
A- I find my friends and then hook up online.
B - Type in chat: "Please let me join, please I beg of you."
3. How does the climate stay positive? Is there any bullying? A way to manage unruly players?
A - If in the same room with friends it's positive or with players of the same age or younger, it's friendly because they don't have as much time invested. I feel I am in control of myself, if I don't feel comfortable, I just leave the room.
B - Some people are buttheads and destroy everything I have and loved.
B - Some people are buttheads and destroy everything I have and loved.
4. What draws you to put in so much time?
A - The individual accomplishment of reaching a new level, it's not competitive with others. Appreciate the collaboration.
B - It's fun to build stuff. Most games are about fighting/killing.
B - It's fun to build stuff. Most games are about fighting/killing.
5. How do you get more members to join? Is it about getting the numbers to increase?
A - Not really trying to do that, it's very individual.
I was most interested in the culture of gaming, what the interactions are like, how relationships are formed and what the draw really is to invest so much time in a game. I wondered if it is a certain personality type that plays or if the environment of mmogs only appeals to a certain type of 'student'.
It seems from my interview of the female gamer that there is a lot of self regulation and collaboration amongst known peers, it's not necessarily strangers gathering to succeed. She prefers to stay connected with friends, maybe there is safety in numbers or just in creating your own positive environment. However, the male gamer seemed more confident about navigating his way around the gaming world, disgruntled by 'buttheads' but not letting them influence his experience. Not sure if this due to genders or personalities. This could also be due to the fact that I interviewed teenagers, I would suspect older more experienced gamers would be more confident to navigate the gaming world solo, like the male interviewee. The motivation to play seems to be intrinsic and based on individual improvements. There is not necessarily a competition to be in the best team/guild or to work with the top players but rather to work at your own level, making individual accomplishments. This self seeking collaboration and motivation would lend well to education, with students self regulating their own achievements and creating their own learning collectives with peers. By doing so they would be creating their own comfort zone to participate in. They could focus on their own immediate part of the gaming world and individual successes and wouldn't necessarily get hung up on what the cream of the crop are doing. A positive, calm, self created learning environment with friends to collaborate and motivation to improve individually. Definitely sounds like something education should learn from!
Thomas, D. & Brown, J. (2011). A New Culture of Learning: Cultivating the Imagination for a World of Constant Change.
Thomas and Brown state "In almost all guilds, players are required both to participate - they can't just sit back and watch everyone else - and to advance the progression of the guild." And it sounds like if you don't participate, you will be told to leave. So how could we motivate students to get involved? Is it only those interested that will participate? Or those with outgoing personalities? Or maybe those with the skills to successfully navigate the game well? Thomas and Brown also say in mmogs imagination is required. "And where imaginations play, learning happens." But I wonder can you force imagination?
It seems from my interview of the female gamer that there is a lot of self regulation and collaboration amongst known peers, it's not necessarily strangers gathering to succeed. She prefers to stay connected with friends, maybe there is safety in numbers or just in creating your own positive environment. However, the male gamer seemed more confident about navigating his way around the gaming world, disgruntled by 'buttheads' but not letting them influence his experience. Not sure if this due to genders or personalities. This could also be due to the fact that I interviewed teenagers, I would suspect older more experienced gamers would be more confident to navigate the gaming world solo, like the male interviewee. The motivation to play seems to be intrinsic and based on individual improvements. There is not necessarily a competition to be in the best team/guild or to work with the top players but rather to work at your own level, making individual accomplishments. This self seeking collaboration and motivation would lend well to education, with students self regulating their own achievements and creating their own learning collectives with peers. By doing so they would be creating their own comfort zone to participate in. They could focus on their own immediate part of the gaming world and individual successes and wouldn't necessarily get hung up on what the cream of the crop are doing. A positive, calm, self created learning environment with friends to collaborate and motivation to improve individually. Definitely sounds like something education should learn from!
Thomas, D. & Brown, J. (2011). A New Culture of Learning: Cultivating the Imagination for a World of Constant Change.
You ask, "So how could we motivate students to get involved? Is it only those interested that will participate?" I wondered the same thing. I tried to find valid stats of how many people are gamers. I found many number in the 50% range. So, if we go with that number, that means the other 50% are not. Do we now need to figure out how to motivate the other 50% to participate in gaming? Do we differentiate and giving gaming opportunities to the 50% that are interested? This, like many decisions in education, is turning out to be quite complex. Gaming may appeal to many students. But it is not the "magic bullet" (I don't like that term).
ReplyDeleteYeah, I agree. I don't know why I always fall down into that rabbit hole thinking there's a blanket solution. (Probably cause it's easiest to believe so :) Students are all different so ideally their education should be. But how do we differentiate it? Heading to self motivating learning seems like it should work, but then are they only going to focus on what they are interested in? Would that even be a problem? Ahhh... round and round and round my thoughts go!
ReplyDeleteAndrea - I think the comment made by one gamer, "some people are buttheads and destroy everything I have and loved," is funny, because my own son experienced that a lot early on in Minecraft with one of his cousins. He would get so upset it would cross over to real life, and we finally had to make them stop getting on eachother's servers - it was like they were begging for it! I think this can happen in real life groups as well, when one member is not committed to the vision, it is easy for them to not pull their weight, or even to do subtle things that in small ways sabotage the work of the group. We see this with adult work groups sometimes, and often when we force collaborative groups in the classroom. Often those who are "committed" are in it for the grade, which I think is the wrong motivation. I think if we are going to really pursue the idea of collaboration in the classroom we have to think carefully about how we want to structure that. We definitely know the beneficial skills that can emerge from practicing purposeful collaboration, but on the flip side, when we force it for projects that are not meaningful for the students, they can learn bad skills too. This can extend to the point where students really hate to work on group projects, and explains a lot why kids often beg to work with friends. It's not so they can just mess around, but because if they are going to put work into something, they want to do it with people they know they get along with. I can't blame them, I'm the same when working on any project. I'm grown up enough to realize that not every project I'm tasked with will be fun or exciting, but I know that with the right people, we can accomplish it, and even have some fun and maybe do something innovative along the way. I know there are certain people I'd much rather work on those projects with - people who I get along with, whose opinions I value, and who I know will bring some creativity or different perspectives to the work. I don't want to work with people who I know are lazy, will get the group off track (subtle sabotage), or whose personalities I just do not mesh well with. In that respect, I'm no different from any kid in any classroom being asked to work on a group project. I think this also ties in with an idea Heather brought out in her post - that sometimes environments create leaders. When we, as adults, or our students enter group projects with self-chosen groups, often leaders emerge, and it's not always the same people. So how do we structure our classroom environments to allow the best collaborative groups to form? How do we create environments that allow students to be motivated and committed, and allow leaders to emerge? This is the big question, because although we may not have the exact answer, we know that it requires a big shift from the way we currently do things.
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