"Its' not just about turning your library over to games... it's about thinking what it means to play as an alternative system of learning."
Jenkins spoke about the irony of a gaming symposium on the biggest reading weekend of the year, reminded us that gamers consume across mediums, and challenged us to think about
what constitutes play and what constitutes learning?
He shared a personal story about his son playing Power Play (Doonesbury Election Game) http://www.powerpolitics.us/about.htm, and when his son brought it to school, discovered a
BOOK about the political process is ok; a GAME is not. The experience was personal and Henry spoke about working on the local level to change the way people think about learning
He referenced the Civilization project
Sneaking in and cheating by looking at their textbooks to solve What If? scenarios, and had inner city students who learned history on the Guns Germs & Steel level (by Jared Diamond) http://www.pbs.org/gunsgermssteel/. A similiar case study can be found in Arts of the Contact Zone by Mary Louise Pratt - the literacy process brought about by baseball card collecting.
Sometimes a passion spurs literacy around a subject.
iCue, a new game debuting in fall 2007 to engage kids in learning about politics, current events and media http://icue.com/
The spelling bee model is not instructive or engaging; compare to Scrabble, which is much more interactive
Scot Osterweil, Education Arcade http://cms.mit.edu/people/staff.php
The game becomes only one element in a serious game because of the reading and engagement
Children under 6 spend almost 2 hours a day using screen media
Kaiser Foundation
9% play games
83% have screen time and play outside around 2 hours a day
79% are read to
73% wach tv and watch video/DVD
Instead of "Screen Media BAD" Limit it, consider how to creatively ethically imaginatively
Pew Internet & American Life http://www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/166/report_display.asp
57% media creators
33 % share
22 % homepages
19% blog
19% remix content
Girl more likely to engage in content creation; race not a factor urban kids are most likely.
What about the 43% who do not participate?
this points to the role librarians want play.
Defined participatory culture as one with:
Low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement
support for creating and sharing
informal mentoring
contributions matter
social connection between memebr
Adults and kids learn from each other w/o a fixed age hierar
chy "Fluidity of relationships"
HP is a book that is teaching kids to WRITE.
Social sills and cultural competencies
Kids who grow up playing games and with access to technology are much more comfortable with tech in the classroom
Think about what these kids need not just extended hours, but help thinking about the process
The transparency problem
unless we couplea critical approach to media... we are not in asituation where we can help this generation move. Think about emdia critically
The Ethics Problems
Livejournal peaks at 18 the age of a high school newspaper editor
Kids need:
access to skills
abilty to articulate their understanding
Socialization
Need to know
Traditional Print Literacy
Research Skills (evaluating Wikipedia)
Technical Skills (computing & codig)
Media Literacy (institutions and practices through which media circulates
"Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century" MacArthur Foundation
http://www.digitallearning.macfound.org/site/c.enJLKQNlFiG/b.2108773/apps/nl/content2.asp?content_id=%7BCD911571-0240-4714-A93B-1D0C07C7B6C1%7D¬oc=1
Project NML.org
Play the capacity to experiment with your surroundings as a form of problem solving (scientific method)
Learn by failure insead of by success
Simulation - the ability to interpret and construct dynamic models of real world processes
Performance: the ability to adopy alernative identities forthe purpose of improvization and discovery
Appropriation - the ability to meaningfully sample and remix media content
3-D Game Based Filmmaking: The Art of Machinima
Rise of the Machinma
Remixing as a skill that has shaped human history
Ricardo Filtzwalli
Nothing new under the sun - Shakespeare wrote fan fiction!
Multitasking the ability to san one's environment and shift focus onto salient detials on an ad hoc basis
Arcadia
Distributed Cognition the ability to interact meaninfully with tools which expand out mental capacity
http://www.shockwave.com/contentPlay/shockwave.jsp?id=arcadia
Collective Intelligence -- the ability to pool knowledge and compare notes with others towards a common goal
(Alternative reality games like I love bees Halo 2 promotion)
Judgement the ability to evaulation the reliability and flow
Transmedia Navigation the ability to deal with the flow of sories and information across multiple modalities (Pokemon)
Networking-- the ability to search, synthesize and disseminate information (Lost)
Are youth safer working through this stuff alone? Or doing it with a mentor and expert?
DOPA isa fight we have to win
Negotiation -- the ability to travel acorss diverse commnities, discerning and respecting multiple perspectives, and grasping and following alternative sets of norms.
Info Facilitator or coach: Librarian as search engine!
Understand how games work and game space learning work - play WITH the kids and help them understand
Tinkering Space
John Seely Brown
Examples:
Global Kids Barry Joseph Teen Second Life
Urban Games Academy (Baltimore)
Showcase machinima
The library is part of a social network
Q: How did you decide to work with NBC?
A. They came to us, because they recognize they are losing viewers
Q. What's Your Favorite Video Game
A. Tetris. I'm more of a casual gamer. I have a respect for the Sims, Pheonix Right (DS)
Q. Are you working with the NY school with the MacArthur Foundation grant?
A. Yes! On game design process as motivating learning.
