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The over-riding reason for interest in this field is that computer games seem to motivate young people in a way that formal education doesn't.

It is repeatedly pointed out, for example, that young people of their own volition choose to spend many hours playing complex computer games outside school. Games, it seems, 'have something', they seem to have a way of engaging and interesting young people. The desire to harness this motivational power to encourage young people to want to learn is the main driver behind an interest in computer games for learning.

Increasing numbers of researchers and teachers are also beginning to suggest that games play develops young people's thinking in a way that we need to pay attention to. A raft of books have recently been published arguing that young people's minds are now 'reprogrammed' through playing computer games. Tapscott's Net Generation, in particular, and research in educational psychology by, amongst others, Patricia Marks Greenfield, argues that young people's regular and intensive games play is developing in them a set of new cognitive abilities. These are summarised by Marc Prensky as:

1. Twitch speed vs conventional speed
2. Parallel processing vs linear processing
3. Graphics first vs text first
4. Random access vs step by step
5. Connected vs stand alone
6. Active vs passive
7. Play vs work
8. Pay-off vs patience
9. Fantasy vs reality
10. Technology as friend vs technology as foe

These ten characteristics could be explained as young people developing the ability to process information very quickly, determining what is and is not of relevance to them; the ability to process information in parallel at the same time from a range of different sources; the familiarity with exploring information in a non-linear fashion - ie by 'jumping' through a range of different information resources, creating links rather than following a 'story'; the tendency to access information in the first instance through imagery and then use text to clarify, expand and explore; familiarity with networked, non-geographically bounded networks of communication; a relaxed approach to 'play', viewing this as a valid activity and conceptualising the computer as primarily a 'play tool'; expecting reward for activities; and having a model of doing in order to learn, rather than learning in order to do. Finally, these characteristics also include a relaxed acceptance of fantasy as a valid space of experience and a view of technology as a friend, familiar through having grown up with it.

While it is important for us to recognise that the tools and technology young people are growing up with are likely to allow them to 'think differently' by providing different models for thinking, we also need to treat the assumption that we have a qualitatively 'new' generation growing up, with some caution. As Prensky argues, 'there are plenty of people who do not prefer games as a way to learn'. Similarly, we know that children's relationships with games vary widely from child to child, with some children playing regularly, others rarely at all, with preferences ranging from strategy games to shoot-'em-ups to puzzles. Further, we know that there are major differences in terms of regularity and types of games play between boys and girls. To lump all children together as a new 'net generation' and to assume we can find a one size fits all answer, is to ignore the diversity that exists amongst young people as it does amongst adults. As Toni Downes has argued, based on a significant study of children's use of computers and consoles in the home:

[This study] would seem to contradict the assertion by several influential authors that computers (particularly game playing) are a central feature of children's everyday lives. While it would be fair to say that for many children today a computer is part of the furniture in their home, for the vast majority of children electronic games are a regular but not a central part of their lives. This suggests that much of the rhetoric regarding fundamental shifts in children's world views and in their predispositions to learning and thinking needs to be carefully scrutinised. (p201)

This does not, however, mean that we should turn away from attempting to explore what the features of games are that might provide interest and motivation for young people to learn, even though we may recognise that we need to provide a range of different environments for different groups of young people.

A second set of arguments that link games and learning together, however, are to do with trying to develop digital environments that support new forms of learning. It has long been argued, for example, that the lecture-based model of teaching in many schools and universities is a very ineffective method of ensuring that learning actually takes place. Other models of learning have been put forward, notably 'learning by doing' and 'situated learning', and games are seen as environments that could actively support these practices. Similarly, the games environment is seen as one that can support both the mundane 'acquisition of facts' through drill and practice, and the complex acquisition of process skills through simulation. Games, it seems, hold the potential to both motivate and encourage diverse ways of engaging with learning.

To date, however, many of these assumptions are purely theoretical, with evidence at best anecdotal. Around the western world academics, games companies and technology corporations are increasingly establishing research programmes to attempt to understand these issues: the MIT Games to Teach programme, Abertay University's 'Play to Win' research centre and, of course, Futurelab's own research and development programme, are just some examples of the attention increasingly being given to figuring out which of these 'theories' about learning with games might stand up to critically evaluated research.

The following summary highlights just some of the key issues and research in the field of computer games, learning and cultures of gaming:

1. Computer games and motivation
2. Computer games and learning
3. Assessment
4. Children's out of school games use
5. Gender and computer games


SO WHAT DO WE THINK WE KNOW NOW?

Computer games and motivation

For over 20 years, people have been trying to figure out just what it is that makes computer games motivating. In 1980 Thomas Malone argued that the key features that contributed to motivation to play games were 'challenge', 'fantasy' and 'curiosity'. He argued primarily that 'in order for an environment to be challenging, it must provide goals whose attainment is uncertain'. (p50)

Similarly, Prensky draws upon Malone and others to develop a set of key criteria that encourage engagement with the game. He argues that games are defined by a set of key characteristics:

1. Rules
2. Goals and objectives
3. Outcomes and feedback
4. Conflict/competition/challenge/opposition
5. Interaction
6. Representation or story

And again, Jones argues that the following characteristics are essential to the design of engaging environments:

1. Task that we can complete
2. Ability to concentrate on task
3. Task has clear goals
4. Task provides immediate feedback
5. Deep but effortless involvement (losing awareness of worry and frustration of everyday activity)
6. Exercising a sense of control over our actions
7. Concern for self disappears during flow, but sense of self is stronger after flow activity
8. Sense of duration of time is altered

All of the above draw on Csikszentmihalyi's (I can't pronounce it either) definition of 'flow'. Prensky describes this as:

In the flow state, the challenges presented and your ability to solve them are almost perfectly matched, and you often accomplish things that you didn't think you could, along with a great deal of pleasure. There can be flow in work, sports, and even learning, such as when concepts become clear and how to solve problems obvious. (p124)

While Malone cites Csikszentmihalyi's characteristics of 'flow' that are relevant to understanding how games might motivate as:

1. The activity should be structured so that the actor can increase or decrease the level of challenges he is facing, in order to match exactly his skills with the requirements for action.

2. It should be easy to isolate the activity, at least at the perceptual level, from other stimuli, external or internal, which might interfere with involvement in it.

3. There should be clear criteria for performance; one should be able to evaluate how well or how poorly one is doing at any time.

(CONTINUE...)