Consolarium: games-based learning to boost performance

Oor Derek, my Learning and Teaching Scotland colleague who kick-started the Consolarium 18 months ago, had a whirlwind tour of the BBC's morning television and radio shows last Friday. Quote of the day for me from Derek: "Good teachers use good resources".

I've brought a few of the clips together for those of you who couldn't make it up for 6.20am, which provide some more details of the next big project we are planning at LTS: placing 500 Nintendo DSes into 16 schools across the country as part of a research project. We hope to find out if the results of our small project last year, where attainment and self-confidence benefited from short daily sessions with Dr Kawashima's Brain Training, can be maintained across so many different schools across the country.

Unfortunately, it would seem that the various 'couch opponents' the Beeb brought on to discuss the project hadn't actually had time to read up on why we are pursuing this. It's not about replacing the teacher, as Derek says, but it is about seeing the potential in yet another resource. That, it has to be said, is what all new technology work is about which leaves most 'opponents' to change of this nature with a rather shaky leg to stand on.

All rights on this video: BBC. ©BBC 2008.
Find another clip from later that morning here.

Comments

[Tom Barrett]

First of all thankyou for the effort to summarise for us the coverage. I am looking forward to the results of the larger scale study beginning after Easter. The first study had some very interesting results and combined with the children's (@ our school) obvious enjoyment when playing such games, we cannot ignore this technology anymore. I have been playing Kageyama's Maths training for a while now and the more I do, the more I think I could use it to support teaching and learning in my classroom.

The benefit of that particular title to me is that the learning games are all available form the start - they do not have to unlocked over time. Groups of children could be directed to a specific game or activity. I lent my DS to my head for the afternoon and he spent most of the time trying to beat my 8 times table time. He returned it later that day and declared he had beaten it by 1 second. For us we have seen the children using them and it is clear that it is their most commonly used technology, by far. I will be following the LTS trial and hope to be harnessing the power of this technology in our classrooms soon.

[Kim Pericles]

Thanks for bringing these clips together Ewan, I'd been all over the place trying to see Derek on the small screen last week. :)

Looking forward to your large scale trial - it will provide a lot of information for everyone to look at and it will be very interesting to see what comes out!

In the meantime, let's keep on exploring/using the positive benefits of digital games to enhance learning (and teaching!)

[Pat]

Thanks for sharing these clips. I'm interested in seeing the final results when all of the school's data is turned in. It is funny that not too long ago the "experts" were saying that video game playing caused ADD. (I have to admit loving the accents in these clips because I don't have much of a chance to hearing these wonderful voices here in South Carolina!)

[David Muir]

Thanks for posting the video. I thought Derek was good but didn't think much of either of the people they set against him. I found the chap in the other clip particularly confusing. I started a response in YouTube but ended up blogging about it. Changing perceptions or supporting good teaching? I know which one I'm going for.