This course being exploratory by nature, I have wanted to start acquiring an understanding of the possible educational benefits of digital games by trying the older but simpler “classics” (especially since my late digital game experiences have exclusively revolved around Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 or PES). These games are the most easier and most interesting to start with because of the lower number of principles of engagement they are built around.

Skills in old-fashion games

I have found that these games put into practice and therefore, may help develop, the following skills:

Space Invaders, Frogger and Pacman all require the user to be strongly aware of what is happening around them. Failure to do so inevitably leads to the loss of a life, which can end up being frustrated once we've outperformed ourselves. This is particularly true given the fact those games don't allow us to restart from the last level reached.

Complementing the former in establishing eye-hand coordination, quickness of action is critical if we are to have any chance of succeeding in those games: however fast our thinking may be, it is useless if we let any of the ghosts catch our Pacman character, the right-edge of the screen kill of Frog or the Space Invaders damage our canon.

Although usually needed from the first level, observation and pattern recognition become increasingly critical as we progress through the game.

 

Observation

As an example of the simpler form of observation in Frogger, it took me a while to notice that the last row of trunks before reaching the opposite side of the river were flowing right to left (as opposed to those in the first rows)!

Before that illuminating grasp, I had been thinking “How am I gonna be able get my frog to the first spot?” (represented on the top-left corner of the screenshot below). And then, I would start from the bottom-left corner, wait for the right timing and jump as quickly as possible, only to realise that that approach wouldn't take me anywhere! - especially where I wanted to go

I would then think that the goal was impossible to reach (and start thinking whether the developer had done a faithful job in re-creating that game in Flash)

 

Screenshot: Figuring out how to play Frogger

 

I was eventually able to force myself stopping experiencing for a few moments and start observing. It became obvious that I had missed an unmissable aspect of the game. Little reflection and “strategic planning” then helped me reach the following level.

Greenfield (1984) later made me realise this was merely unfortunate and sent me straight to the digital immigrant category:

While reading the article, I realised I had equally missed crucial aspects of Pacman by thinking ghosts vulnerability happened randomly (let alone the various characteristics of the ghosts which went totally unnoticed)!

On a more positive note, I did pay attention to generate as little damage as possible to my bunkers while trying to shoot the Space Invaders.

 

Pattern recognition

While having Pacman go round a part of the maze to help him avoid a ghost, I realised that I was using a pattern I was familiar with.

• Interestingly, my first thought was that it came from PES, where (being an Arsenal style-of-play fan), I often use “triangular” passes between my players (3 obviously) to prevent 1 or 2 opponents to get hold of the ball.
• I then thought it more likely came from going round the dining room table to escape from my dad while playing with him.

But thinking twice, I'm not sure which of the previous mostly applies and this interestingly brings up the crucial issue of transfer, which I feel Greenfield hasn't explored in sufficient detail.

I'm not clear whether anticipation is redundant with the skills previously detailed or whether it's the link between:

• observation and strategic planning

  and

• quickness of action

As illustrated by my experience with playing Frogger, applying what the player has learnt from his/her mistakes is obviously critical for the learning process and related improvements to occur.

 

Like many games (Greenfield 1984), Pacman could possibly help develop orientation skills

 

 

Arcade games and more traditional learning activities

 

Importantly, I think all those skills which are tightly related to the characteristics of experiential learning (Kolb 1993) are essential to learn effectively in both informal and formal settings. For example:

• Good perception and quickness of action are crucial to the chemist learner to prevent dangerous reactions in the case of a faulty experiment.

• Observation, pattern recognition and reflection are continuously brought to play in virtually all formal and informal learning activity. They are particularly useful to acquire mastery, itself an important condition for effective transfer (see for example, Bransford et al 2000)

• In the above example, experimentation is essential for the chemist learner to apply the understandings they've gained from that “bad” experience in order to carry on learning.

Another similarity with traditional education is that virtually all computer games implement some form of cognitive scaffolding: increasingly difficult skills are being developed on top of those called into play in the previous levels.

 

The matter of transfer then becomes central to our understanding of the effectiveness of using video games to improve learning-related skills in traditional contexts.

 

 

 

References:

 

Bransford, J.D., Brown, A.L. and Cocking, R.R. (2000). Learning and transfer. In How people learn: brain, mind, experience, and school (Washington, D.C., National Academy Press)

Greenfield, P. M. (1984). Video games. In Mind and media: the effects of television, video games, and computers. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press.

Kolb, D. (1993). The process of experiential learning. In Culture and processes of adult learning.

M. Thorpe, R. Edwards, and A. Hanson (Eds.). (Buckingham, OUP): pp. 138-156.

Frogger (1981). Arcade game. Sega/Gremlin. Flash version created by Paul Neave accessible at: http://www.neave.com/games/frogger/

Pacman (1980). Arcade game. Namco. Flash version available at:
http://www.pacmangame.net/

Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 (2007). Football game. Konami.

Space Invaders (1978). Arcade game. Midway. Flash version available at:
http://www.arcadelist.com/Play_Online.asp?Title=Space_Invaders