2005 Workshop on Challenges and Opportunities in Game-based Learning

CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES IN GAME-BASED LEARNING

 

Nov 2, 2005

 

Lecture Room

The National Academies

2101 Constitution Ave., NW

Washington, DC

 

See hardcopy of agenda here.

 

SESSION

SLIDES/REMARKS

Agenda

 

8:25 am: Opening Remarks

Merrilea Mayo, Director, Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable,

The National Academies

 Not recorded

8:30 – 9:00 am: The State of “Serious Games"

Chair: Norman Fortenberry, Director, Center for the Advancement of Scholarship on Engineering Education, The National Academies

 

  • Ben Sawyer, Co-Founder, Serious Games and Co-Founder, Digital Mill

Mr. Sawyer discussed the scope, growth, and potential of game-based learning activity in the U.S. and abroad, reflecting on his experiences co-founding the Serious Games conferences, whose attendance grew from 20 to 500 people in only two years.

 Not recorded.

9:00 – 10:30 am: Surprising Facets of Game-Based Learning

Chair: James Gee, Tashia Morgridge Professor of Reading, Department of Curriculum and Instruction and Department of Educational Psychology, University of Wisconsin

 

  • Ted Castronova, Associate Professor, Telecommunications Dept., Indiana University

Dr. Castronova’s highly cited and seminal work on the economics of virtual worlds illustrates the fine (and disappearing) line between paper money and virtual money used in virtual worlds. His work has caused many to postulate that virtual worlds may be more “real” than the world we physically inhabit, with implications for the controlled study of many social phenomena beyond economics.

 

  • Cory Ondrejka, Vice President of Product Development, Second Life

Mr. Ondrejka will describe the formalized peer-to-peer learning experiences that have spontaneously arisen in his company’s virtual world. In an environment where anyone can create anything, from houses to guns, many have chosen to create schools, seminars, and learning experiences instead – from skydiving instruction to schizophrenia awareness.

 

  • Jerry Heneghan, Chief Executive Officer; and Todd Borghesani, Bus. Development Officer; Virtual Heroes

With more than 5 million registered players, the America’s Army game stands out as a success story in providing massively parallel education to the public. Interwoven into the game are instructional modules nearly identical to those received by army recruits, assessment tools to evaluate competency, and hierarchical training experiences to engage the player as he moves forward in his virtual army career. Messrs. Heneghan and Borghesani of Virtual Heroes, the company currently responsible for deploying America’s Army, will reflect on the game’s capabilities, then discuss the possibility of extending this successful model to science and space exploration games.

 

 

 

 

 

Castronova's presentation slides

Ondrejka's presentation slides

Heneghan and Borghesani's presentation slides

11:00 – 12:00 noon: Learning and Behavioral Outcomes for Games: Research Studies

Chair: Kurt Squire, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Curriculum and Instruction, University of Wisconsin

 

  • Debra Lieberman, Media Researcher, Institute for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Research, University of California, Santa Barbara.

Dr. Lieberman helped design Nintendo games that improved children's and adolescents' self-management of asthma, diabetes, and other chronic illnesses, and decreased their emergency and urgent-care visits by as much as 77 percent. She will present the theory-based design of the games and research findings from clinical trials, and will reflect on reasons why players improved their health-related knowledge, behaviors, and outcomes beyond simply following “doctor’s orders.” 

 

  • Tom Baranowski, Professor of Pediatrics, Baylor College of Medicine

In one of the largest and most rigorous experimental studies of gaming effectiveness, Dr. Baranowski and colleagues showed that game-based activities could stimulate school-aged children to increase their fruit and vegetable intake by one serving a day, an increase of about 30%.

 

  • Brian Slator, Professor, Dept. of Computer Science, North Dakota State University

The time-honored lecture has been demonstrated by many researchers as perhaps the least effective means of transmitting information to students. Dr. Slator and colleagues’ study on using MMOGs (massive multiplayer online games) to teach cell biology and geology yields a fascinating comparison of the effectiveness of traditional lecture, web-based learning modules, and MMOGs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Liberman's presentation slides

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Baranowski's presentation slides

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Slator's presentation slides

1:15 - 2:15 pm: Current Policy Drivers and Research Needs

Chair: Mike Zyda, Director, GamePipe Laboratory, Information Sciences Institute, University of Southern California

 

  • Clifford Lynch, Executive Director, Coalition on Networked Information

Dr. Lynch will speculate on the multiplicity of ways in which games for teaching and learning interconnect with the broad system of scholarly communication – particularly in light of some of the ways this system is evolving in response to developments in e-science and e-research – and discuss a wide range of open research problems surrounding these interfaces.

 

  • Bryan Barnett, Lead Program Manager, External Research Programs, Microsoft Research

In a model that may extend to other disciplines, Microsoft seeks to increase the number of U.S. students qualified to enter careers in information technology by reinvigorating computer science curricula with computer gaming technologies. Mr. Barnett will describe Microsoft’s current vision and program, as well as detail the challenges and successes encountered along the way.

 

  • Henry Kelly, President, Federation of American Scientists

The Federation of American Scientists created the Learning Federation to advance and pursue an agenda of digitally-delivered learning environments, including game-based learning. Dr. Kelly will present the R&D roadmap developed by the Learning Federation and describe Congressional initiatives that might make this roadmap a reality.

 

 

Zyda's presentation slidesNew Link

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2:45 – 4:25 pm: Landscape Survey of Current Federal Agency Activities

Chair: Dave Rejeski, Director, Foresight and Governance Project Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars

 

Each of the following speakers will describe ongoing programs and potential future activities relevant to his agency:

 

  • Lawrence (Tony) Beck, Scientific Officer, NationalCenter for Research Resources, National Institutes of Health
  • Russell Shilling, Program Manager, Office of Naval Research
  • Robert Wisher, Director, Advanced Distributed Learning Initiative, Office of the Secretary of Defense
  • Lee Zia, National Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Education Digital Library Program, National Science Foundation
  • Priscilla Elfrey, Program Manager, Simulation Outreach and Engineering Integration, Kennedy Space Center, NASA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Beck's presentation slides

 

Shilling's presentation slides

 

Wisher's presentation slides

 

Zia's presentation slides

 

 

Elfrey's presentation slides