World renowned game designer and author of “Reality is Broken”, Jane McGonigal, speaks at Microsoft’s 2011 U.S. Innovative Education Forum. Cameron Evans interviews McGonigal on the key takeaways for teachers.
As I complete Unit 5 in the EdX Design and Development of Games for Learning, we are now talking about assessment. I found the following video useful in looking at the engagement in a game as a way to identify assessment that matters in real life. Jan McGonigal talks about how feedback and the mind set to try and fail help games win out as not a single shot assessment, but as a way to get feedback to get to your best.
First off, this interview situation is a bit like our Sage Room Learning Lab/ Studio. An “interview” is ongoing in front of what could be a green screen backdrop with anything there.
Second Jane has a lot to say about gaming and 21st century skills.
Third, the idea of “programmed failure”, where the standard MO is failure over and over again, such as moving up the levels in video games…is an insightful observation. This also potentially offers an alternative to the present fairly static testing procedures of NCLB. Testing incorporated into the learning process, and not external to it, and not just a one time snapshot, but an ongoing process.
Fourth, formative assessment in real time or “adaptive learning” can easily be embedded in a game…and makes a LOT of sense to do so. In a way, a DLE might be considered to be a series of containers, like Russian Dolls, layers within layers, where different functions can be inserted.
However, It’s hard to say which is the outermost container…and where a function should be embedded…which specific layer. And it’s also possible to view containers within containers as being too limited…that instead the various functions need to be “mashed” together in more intuitive and free flowing ways. Which is a challenge, if so.