The product: the lustful learning

As a remedial teacher I usually gets those students who have one or more challenges (I refuse to say difficulties or problems!). Now I help one student and the more I talk with him, the more I start to wonder why we - the school system - insist on teaching like it would be 1980 and not 2016. Even if the Internet didn't exist throughout the teacher's life, there have been in our students' whole lives. 

This one student is judged by the 1980's methods and therefore he possesses not what the knowledge society requires. If you, on the other hand, use the methods of 2016 he actually master the skills needed more than many else.

According to traditional values, he has an abnormal and unhealthy interest in video games and no matter what he does, they consider it as dangerous gaming. Still, traditional thinking, he needs help and support in mathematics, physics, languages, social situations. He can't handle money (he doesn't understand the value of money), can't hold times, can't think logical, need a calculator and the list goes on and on and on...

When I first met him, the Fall of 2014, he was top 20 in the European league of "World of Tanks" and besides that also second in rank in his clan (including set up strategy's, handle price money and be the ambassador). Now, he has stepped down from the active gaming and instead run the whole clan by himself. 

Just to check if he was aware of what he's doing I showed him the school's organizational chart and asked him to tell me, based on this, how his organization looks. Hardly surprising, he placed his organization in the right places; CEO, deputy CEO, management, economy and so on. He also explained how he pay wages (in game money) to his whole clan (approx 75 people), the bonus system he use for unsocial hours (if they get attacked for example 04:00) and more. "doesn't understand the value of money"!? What a rubbish nonsense!

So, as you all understand, this is a guy that learn in a different way but in a way I think will be only more common. And just because they do learn a different way it's not because they are stupid.

But today, 2016, the school ain't ready for those students so therefor we're back at square one. Here we need the remedial teacher (me)...

According to regulations I should ask the owner of the course (who use traditional methods) about course content to use on this student to help him understand the things in an outdated view. To clarify: it is not up to me to interpret the curriculum. 

But now it felt so wrong, I over ruled the regulations and went to my supervisor and asked; do I help this guy as the individual teacher wants or can I interpret the curriculum myself? 

For the record, it's very clear in the curriculum what you need to know so there's no law broken, but different interpretations juxtapose.

I got the decision: interpret yourself as it won't work otherwise.

Now, to my lot, I have math and physics. I would actually have to have even the language, because if you're not from the start English-speaking, you become it through computer games.

And here's the funny thing; when you use games in education, you not only teach one course at a time. You can combine, you can do both, you can learn more, you can learn faster and suddenly you also have the lustful learning. The desire to learn and the desire to understand. 

Because it's fun. 

The environment is safe; therefor you can relax and start to learn.

So math and physics. 

And Minecraft. 

Because Minecraft is "AWWSOME!"

Even if you're 18 years old.

To be able to solve the physics we have to start with math. And survival (great choice!) as it's more fun. Yes, more fun and math is present all the way!

"1 coal smelts 8 blocks of iron ore. Burning time of one coal is 80 seconds while burning time of one lava bucket is 920 seconds more. What is the burning time of one lava bucket?" (from the Gameplay Publishing "Minecraft Maths")

It was an easy one; 920+80=1000 seconds.

Next examples are my own, not from the book!

But next one, according to the reports, he would need a calculator: How many minutes is 1000 seconds?

In his head he calculated 16 minutes.

And he had to explain.

"60 seconds multiplied with 10 is 600 seconds. Then I know I have 400 seconds left. 60 multiplied with 6 is 360 seconds. That's 16 minutes. Then of course you have another 40 seconds, so 16 min and 40 seconds if I have to be exact!"

He continued: "if we assume I can fill/empty the furnace constantly I will get 100 iron ingots after one lava bucket, as the burning time for one ingot is 10 seconds"

Now the idea is that we should do the physics part: velocity calculations and for that we have created racing tracks. We will measure how long it will take to walk, run, ride horse, swim, use boat and use minecart for 100 blocks (100 metres). We have already talked about cars speed, your walk speed and so on, but next week we'll figure out how to also do the calculations.

I'm alive! but a bit stressed...

Hi PLN,

I feel a bit bad for not blog that much at the moment, believe me; I have loads that need to come out.

It turned out last fall our students needed help with lots of missing course points, that they somehow havn't taken or havn't been offering. To put together an aid kit of 200 lessons just like that takes energy.

Because I'm the Minecraft teacher I see a lot of benefits with gaming, I teamed up with our sports coordinator (old guy 55+ with a son who played way too much videogames). And together we're trying e-Sport in education.

Or actually, together with Team Menace, ENCE eSports, 100k eSports and SEUL we're building Finnish e-Sport in education! 

It turned out we're the first school in the country to use e-Sport in education! As we also do the "sharing is caring" we're a major hit in the national news. But time? I have really no time to blog about it.

My colleague by the way is an impressive guy, he's the national handball coach for the guys born 1998. He has also started a one of the kind possibility for our top athletics: combine your sport with a vocational degree (google translate works!) Now he/we have students training for the Olympics.

He also convinced me, we should start an e-Sport school tournament! Yeps, so now we're in the middle of that one. But as it's lots of learning possibilities with that, it will be arranged by students and so far we have been able to connect the tournament to four different courses!

As there is so much learning involved when you are about to arrange a tournament we want the students to do as much work as possible. We now have them collaborating with four other students groups/educations. 

Business Information Technican (Swedish: datanom)

These are the students we test the e-Sport concept with, they also arrange the tournament. They also take care of all the matches and the servers.

Electrician (Swedish: elmontör)

We'd need a lot of power to do this!

Business and Administration Clerk (Swedish: merkonom)

Product demonstration of sponsors goods and maybe selling collaboration partner's merchandise.

Media Assistant (Swedish: medie-assistent)

We wanted them to do a "TV-production" of the event. Turned out the national TV is very interested to stream it out via their channels...

Waiter/Waitress (Swedish: servitör)

Will take care of all guests and also our players!

Today we also started to think what if we could get another education envolved

Practical Nurses (Swedish: närvårdare)

As e-Sport more and more turn out to be a wellbeing project, what if we could have some information about nutrition and why not a first aid group?

How do we connect e-Sport in education? 

Well, besides having them in gym every week we also can use the magic of e-Sport and teach different subjects which they otherwise wouldn't be that interested in. They have all installed servers in virtual box but not for real. Last week one great learning opportunity came across.

Our students asked what if the rented server goes down? 

what if the ping isn't good enough in the final? 

Would it be possible to set up one own? 

I replied, why don't you list what's needed and ask my colleague in the lab? 

Turned out we didn't had the parts, but my foreman gave us a go to invest in one because we anyway need one, but only if the students could pick the parts and also explain WHY and WHAT benefits we would have of that server except as a game server.

They started with that task and managed it well. The server parts was ordered and yesterday the rented server actually went down in the middle of one match. But our serverparts came this morning so our students have been sitting on overtime (my lessons stopped 14:45 and they ran home at 17:15) trying to config the server. I'm very impressed and very proud of them!

Just when today's matches should start our own server went down and the rented server got up... So they are highly motivated to come back to school tomorrow and fix the server! And also document the process, as they were too stressed to remember that today :D

Documentation
Here you can find our experiences so far about e-Sport in education.

Games in education

Fittingly enough, I had an interesting conversation this morning with one of my colleagues, the master chef. The other week he coached two students in the international competitions in Cervia, Italy with an extraordinary result: gold medal in class haute cuisine and silver medal in crotch decathlon.

His experience about where students fail are in situations where they often succeed when they play games. In his opinion, key skills for chefs are problem solving, planning, strategy and creativity. 

He has already understood that he must be the link between video games and reality, that what one learns in a game needs students have translated to reality. If that can be done, you have succeed with reaching an higher goal with a small amount of effort.

But he is not using games in education.

Imagine what could be achieved if he did, as our students anyway play games during class...

Real life

He told me quickly this morning how you have to have a plan, use a strategy, that after you serve the first course have the main course to be ready to be served within 7 minutes (in our training restaurant). The serving itself must be done within 2-3 minutes, and so on.

We can't have five chefs who cut onions, then we have five cutting boards and five knives that must be cleaned. You need to communicate and collaborate.

This is the computer game all the way. 

The worst thing is that it's actually HayDay in a nutshell.

Could this be an example how to use computer games in education? Make teachers understand how to benefit from games as the students anyway play? What if you allow one only game...? Will they learn more?

HayDay

My next challenge in HayDay is to fill my riverboat with an unknown amount of raspberry jam, potato bread and potato pancakes.

As in the kitchen you have to be prepared, you have to have done a proper planning or else you won't succeed. When the boat arrives I have between 15 and 16 hours to get the challenge done. Raspberry jam takes 5 hours 57 minutes to make, potato bread 38 minutes and potato pancakes 1 hour 42 minutes. Most probably I will have three crates to fill of each product.

We're doing the math.

• One jar of raspberry jam (5h57min) and I need 3 berries
• One potato bread and I need 2 potatoes, 1 butter, 1 granulated sugar and 3 eggs. 
• One potato pancake and I need 1 potato, 1 egg and 1 goat cheese.

Planning

I need three raspberries which grow on bushes and takes 18h before I can harvest, therefor I must have done this before and I must have a storage. My Jam Factory must be running 24/7.

A lot of resources as milk and eggs require to first make the food for the animals, feed them and after some additional time collect the stuff. Before you could start with the production of that particular ingredients.

For example:

A cow can be milked every hour, assuming you have entered the feed. 3x cattle feed is available from 1 corn and 2 soybeans. Corn takes 5 min to grow while soybean grows at 20 min. The cattle feed itself takes 9 minutes to produce. 

Just to get the milk to the butter to the bread we are talking about the 20 + 8 + 60 min = 88 min or 1h 28 min. The butter takes 25 min and now, before even started with the bread we've spent 1 h 53 min. The bread will take another 38 min, so 2 h 31 min. Will I be able to produce let say 3x3 breads within 15 hours? (probability theory)

Will it be even possible to make it? 

In real life you would have given up by now. 

But, now it's a game. 

It's a challenge. 

You give yourself the heck you can do it. 

Imagine if we could get that feeling, the attitude, into the classroom.

Solution?

Communicate, collaborate, make it happen as a team. Skills you do need in a kitchen so you don't end up with five chefs cutting onions...

Hay Day

My latest thought about games in education is Hay Day. It hit me when I had a discussion with one of our principals that didn't understood the power of Minecraft. So many adults believe they don't play any computer games but they don't see themselves as doing so, this because the games are on their iPad or iPhone.

My mom is an excellent example of someone who doesn't play video games but probably sitting there with a dozen games of "Words With Friends". She has even invented new own rules: we can not change tiles and if someone accidently pass the other part have to return the game with another pass.

WHAT unintentional learning takes place here? 

English vocabulary (meaning and spelling)

WHEN do we learn it? 

When we try to find new words.

WHY do we learn? 

Because it's fun. And it's multiplayer. You stay in touch with friends...

So, in my colleagues mind they don't play games. Only Angry Birds, Candy Crush Saga and HayDay everyday, but no real games. I asked the principal if she had had a second thought what she really learn while playing Hay Day, and she responded right away; I learn nothing!

Yeah right! But indeed an awesome start to discuss what you really learn from Hay Day and soon we could agree on math, problem solving, language and collaboration.

In Hay Day there is already a functioning economy, there are prospects for a cooperative farm (collaboration part). You can complete (and enhance) your finances by having real money to buy in-game money (or diamonds) only for this game (consumer education)

Since there is a cap of each product you will soon learn to see where you can earn extra by, just like the stock market, buying products cheaply and sell expensive. Or if it is really worth investing in. (Economics)

Challenges in the game, fictitious villagers or goods delivered with deadlines and special rewards require you to plan long term. Sometimes you have to estimate the probability of whether it's even possible to meet a challenge because everything has a production time (math).

Some of these challenges is possible only with cooperation with other neighbors. Derbies are limited events that occur in neighborhoods once a week, those which complete tasks listed on the Derby Stand will rank up and work towards special prizes (collaboration).

Of course there are wiki's and as "the game is horribly addicted" you most probably end up search for information at least once (languages).

So why is this important?

What I'd like to do is make my colleagues, teachers, enlighten of the power of games in education they might start with it. It doesn't need to be more complicated than this and most probably it's a game many teachers already know a lot about.

So, when you use a computer game (in this case, Hay Day) it differs from traditional teaching in the classroom. Suddenly we have gained access to a concrete case in which our students can perform financial transactions that affect their way of understanding how financial markets work from a digital, social and educational content that both affect and are important to them. 

Where are we according to SAMR?

By the digital world as Hay Day adds, we can execute trades in a way that had not been possible with just paper and pencil because there already exists an economic system in the game that students (and teachers) are interested of (third level of SAMR: Modification).

Even beyond our educational mission the idea is already alive and exist, it creates entirely new conditions that would not be possible in a regular classroom situation (fourth stage of SAMR: Redefinition).

Take advantage of computer games interest

Today, Friday morning, I realized I have some problems to get the class focus on the task. I also had to ask myself, what is important? what do I want them to learn (especially in this course)?

For a business information technican (datanom) (vocational students), of course a programming skill as PHP or Lua is far more important than to know how to play a video game. But again, what's the purpose of this specific task?

I want them to understand the importance of why you must do a proper documentation and they also have to practice 

• analyze problems
• information retrieval
• plan
• documenting
• test
• evaluate
• report

Therefor I used a twist, 

I took advantage of their gaming interests as they anyway where playing both CSGO and Hearthstone. When they realized I saw, they tried to quickly change windows on the screen. Instead, I surprised them: continue play but start make documentations of your gaming.

When play CSGO: 

you must play as a team and the team must be classmates. You must communicate, must put up with a strategy and you must make a report of it. You must evaluate every match and you must evaluate your own learning.

Hearthstone

almost the same but either you have a random opponent or a classmate. It's easier to evaluate when you play against a classmate as you both have the same experience of the recent game. But again, You must evaluate every match and you must evaluate your own learning. Same as above.

it was long ago it was so quiet in the classroom and focused students. Once I also promised that we can do the same thing another time, another classroom, if they just take the task seriously they also tried to make the best of it. 

It will be interesting to read their reports afterwards.