Embracing Gaming: Leaders in the Field of Technology in Education

In reviewing my peers’ presentations and learning about several leaders in technology, I began to reflect back on my initial posting regarding upcoming trends in technology in the classroom.  One emerging trend in the classroom is that "technology continues to profoundly affect the way we work, collaborate, communicate, and succeed" (Horizon Report 4).  Teachers and students have begun to use more educational communicating devices through tools such as, blackboard and Edmodo.  As I made connections, the leader that stood out to me was Jenny Levine.  Jenny Levine was an advocate for embracing gaming in the educational field.  She believed gaming could be used in regards to content, narratives, storytelling, socialization, connections, and safe communities for our students.  I believe gaming can be a great way for students and peers to communicate and interact with one another.  Online gaming and MMORPG is very popular amongst today’s youth and something teachers are beginning to try to incorporate into the classroom.  Students can work with each other in an online game world to collaborate, socialize, and gather information.  One game I have seen used in the classroom is “Simlandia” in a science classroom.  In the game, the students can talk to their partners and try to solve a mystery on what is contaminating a simulated town’s water.  As the trend of online communicating, collaborating, and gaming continues, I believe the future of the classroom could possibly become mostly virtual.  Over the past few years, we have witnessed online education becoming more and more popular.  Over time, I can see classrooms becoming strictly online and classes meeting in a virtual environment such as, Second Life.

Jenny Levine’s views also support another emerging trend.  Jenny Levine believes with the new technology resources becoming available, there has been a change from pursuing information to receiving information.  This reflects the trend, "The abundance of resources and relationships made easily accessible via the Internet is increasingly challenging us to revisit our roles as educators" (Horizon Report 4).  During the time I have spent in the classroom as an English teacher, I have had my students often make use of computers and the internet for class projects and assignments. Many of these assignments require students to conduct research and cite their sources in order to complete the assignment. During these assignments, myself and my students quickly discovered what an abundant amount of resources were available for them to use from the internet. However, with the abundance of information comes from unreliable sources. As an educator, I had to change my approach in what I needed to teach my students to complete these assignments successfully. Instead of informing my students on how to find resources for activities, I had to shift my focus to instructing them on how to sift through and identify reliable sources from the unreliable sources. Additionally, my role as an English teacher no longer requires me to instruct the students on the details necessary to remember to create a bibliography. The students now have access to internet sites such as Easybib that do this work for them. Instead of teaching the students how to create a citation, I had to teach the students how to correctly use the website that does it for them. Just some of these simple adjustments show that the type of knowledge we need to impart on our students is changing. Now with the internet and information at their fingertips, instead of presenting our students with facts, we need to give our students the knowledge they need to effectively harness the internet to direct themselves.

The NMC Horizon Report: 2011 K-12 Edition, 2011, http://www.nmc.org/pdf/2011-Horizon-Report-K12.pdf

Bernie Dodge on Prezi