Serious Gaming

Last week, I wrote a blog post making the case for gaming in education.  If a teacher wants to increase engagement, enhance learning and explore new models of education, my belief is that gaming may not be a bad option at all.  Of course, Call of Duty or Halo probably won't help with any subject area unless your teaching a firearms course.  Therefore, the type of game you select for your students to play is of the utmost importance.  However, what if you want to simulate real-life issues and have students utilize what they've learned in class in those situations?  This week, I had the chance to explore the area of serious gaming and found that you can combine the fun of gaming while incorporating those real-life applications.

First, let me explain what serious gaming is.  It doesn't imply those marathon gamers that sit like zombies for days in front of a screen playing.  They are simulations of real-world events or processes designed for the purpose of solving a problem.  So developers take serious issues from around the world (ie earthquakes, persecution, etc) and put them in a gaming format for those participating in the game to learn and utilize their skills to solve problems.  While it can definitely be entertaining, the main purpose is to educate gamers and utilize problem solving skills.

I had the opportunity to play one of these serious games recently and was pleasantly surprised.  It was fun yet also thought provoking.  The game is called "Stop Disasters" and is described as a "disaster simulator game from the UN/ISDR (International Strategy for Disaster Reduction)".  The simulation places you as responsible for building shelters and various defense barriers ahead of a coming natural disaster.  You have a limited budget to do so, limited real estate to build on and only 20 minutes to build all you can before the natural disaster arrives.  You can choose a number of regions from around the world to play in and the natural disaster fits that area.  This game can be played in 5 different languages, one of which being Chinese, which is my subject area.

I found the game to be challenging at first (even though I picked the "easy" level) and fun.  I chose to have my setting be in the Southeast Asia region where the coming natural disaster is a Tsunami.  I built hotels, brick houses, sand barriers and other protective defenses in my first game.  However, it wasn't enough.  I needed to build much more according to the game, which I should've detected since I didn't use all of my budget.  Upon trying again, I was able to figure it out, spending much more money on ensuring all people had solid homes and that the defenses were much more secure.  In total I played twice but ended up spending around an hour on "Stop Disasters"

As I mentioned, I had fun playing this and found that the game also helps to meet some learning objectives for Languages Other Than English in New York State.  First, it aids with students needing to communicate in a language other than English.  Second, it also helps cross-cultural skills and understandings by allow students to experience the issues and life-altering disasters that take place in other countries.  One way to assess if the students have met these language objectives is to see how they scored in the game.  Another way is to follow-up with evaluations that look for understanding of the regions and the potential threats to them.