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The Landscape of Digital Learning Games: Finding Paydirt
By Ryan L. Schaaf This article first appeared at Amplify here. Reposted with permission. There are a wide variety of digital games available for players on countless platforms. It makes it very challenging to find a game for a specific purpose such as learning. The first step is to understand the purpose of gameplay. […]
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The Research Supporting Digital Gaming and Learning Part 2: The Gamer’s Gains: Evidence of Efficacy
By Ryan L. Schaaf Preface There are literally thousands of research studies, books, web articles, and news reports examining the effectiveness of games during the learning process. Some of these sources are research in nature; some are based on firsthand experiences or accounts, while others are formed on opinions or even sophistry. The truth is […]
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The Research Supporting Digital Gaming and Learning Part 1: The Gamer’s Brain
By Ryan L. Schaaf This post originally was posted here. Reposted with permission from Amplify Games. Preface There are literally thousands of research studies, books, web articles, and news reports examining the effectiveness of games during the learning process. Some of these sources are research-based, some are first hand experiences or accounts, while others […]
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Setting the Record Straight: The Difference Between Digital Game-Based Learning, Gamification, and Other Related Buzzwords
By Ryan L. Schaaf This post was originally posted here. Reposted with permission from Amplify Games. As more and more educators consider using games in their learning programs, they must understand all of the nuances involved. Today, the buzzwords in education are gamification, play-based learning, gaming, game-based learning, and digital game-based learning. There are some popular misconceptions about these […]
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The Death of Reading As We Know It
What follows is a message that everyone needs to hear regardless of how close they might be to retirement. Most of the people reading this post grew up communicating with text. That’s why today, most schools continue to focus primarily on learning how to communicate with text. Meanwhile, quite some time ago, in the world […]
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Why Are We Called Committed Sardines?
Nicky and I live a very busy and full life of travel and talk, so whenever we start feeling overwhelmed by our schedule, there’s a place we like to visit. It’s the Monterey Aquarium in Monterey, California – the world’s greatest aquarium in our opinion. We were there recently, and after we paid for […]
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Social Media – the New Tobacco
The tycoons of social media have to stop pretending that they are friendly nerd gods trying to build a better world. And admit they’re just tobacco farmers in t-shirts selling an addictive product to children because, let’s face it, checking your likes is the new smoking. A recent 60 Minutes exposed what is called brain […]
Read MoreThe Power of Gaming: A Global Phenomenon
By Ryan L. Schaaf This post was originally posted here. Reposted with permission from Amplify Games. During sporadic times in my life, I would have labeled myself a gamer. I started with the classic Atari 2600 in the early 1980’s (no old jokes, please). As I developed through my adolescence, the video game industry continued to […]
Read MoreDigital Games: Learning through Gameplay – A Prequel
This post was originally posted here. This article is reposted with permission. By Ryan L. Schaaf Have you ever observed a person playing a video game? Have you ever witnessed the intense range of emotions, extreme task commitment, engagement, and focus players experience as they smash buttons and hold on to their game controllers […]
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