SIMS, but Make It Education
I was kind of fascinated by the idea that Geiger and Rickard came up - essentially a prompt-based class role-playing (???) game. I played some of those as a kid, along with various other role-playing games, and I'm sure that it was a formative experience for the way I write now. Mostly because it was a LOT of writing - I noted in my response paper to this chapter that often the minimum word count per post was a 1,000 words (role play moderators could be very strict about that!), and sometimes I would write three of them a day. I can't tell you the last time I wrote 3,000 words in a day.
I'm not even certain that it really classifies as role-playing, since you yourself are the "character," but it's certainly similar to the way those work. My first thought while reading about the MOO was that it seemed kind of outdated - if I were to envision a similar kind of software now, I think it would be a more visual, with actual virtual "spaces" and avatars. I keep thinking about like, Club Penguin or SIMS, but for education. I wonder if they have something like that already? If so it would be really interesting to look at for online classes in particular, though I think for the writing classroom the prompt-based software would certainly get students writing more.
Anyway, what do you guys think about that? Would you do use the MOO (if it's still available) for an online class? In conjunction with a face-to-face class? Why or why not? Do you think that a more visual or text-based software would work better for the writing classroom? Do you think that your students would find navigating it easy, or that even you would, if you're not familiar with the software?
Happy Tuesday! Only a week and a half left in the semester!
Mika,
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure--it's not something I've ever considered, obviously. Like you, I'm fascinated by the idea of using a role playing game in class.
I find that in some cases, my students are much more adept at technology than I am, and in other cases, the seemingly easy (to me) things they struggle with surprise me.
While I like the idea of using MOO or something like it (maybe something more updated, like you mention), I think I would hesitate to bring it into my classroom. Oftentimes, when I try something that I think will be fun and engaging in class, my students really don't respond. It's like they want me to stop trying to be "fun" and just give them the information upfront. This might be a bad response, but it's been my experience so far.
-Shelbi
Mika,
ReplyDeleteAs soon as I saw the title of your blog post, I had to read. I absolutely loved playing the Sims as a kid (and still sometimes dabble). I think gamification in the classroom, especially through role-play, is such a fascinating area of study. I know some of the graduate students in the cohorts ahead of us, specifically Kyle, have worked on gamification. I vaguely remember Kyle mentioning using his avatar from D&D for an assignment in Rory's class, so if you wanted to learn more about applying avatars specifically, you could reach out to him.
I have the same problem as Shelbi: when I try to bring in something I think is fun into the classroom, my students aren't always as responsive as I hope. I brought in a Jeopardy review game on MLA format, and they got so competitive it sucked the fun right out of the game. Some of them flat out refused to participate, not willing to see the potential fun in it in the first place. The ones who got competitive eventually got hostile to the point where I had to threaten to shut down the activity if they did not quiet down. I had no idea why this happened, as there was literally no reward for winning. I even had one of my students (he volunteered) get up and be the host for a little while, so I could have a short break from them screaming at me. Although this backfired in so many ways, I can at least say some of them participated, maybe even a little too much.
I think there's always a risk when new ideas or tools are brought into the classroom. I don't think this risk is a reason not to do it. Part of our teaching should be pushing ourselves out of our comfort zones as we push our students out of theirs through many of the new and radical theories we introduce, as we should always be giving the same effort.
-Natalie
Hi, Natalie!
DeleteI miss SIMS so much! I wish I still had a laptop with a CD-ROM so I could play the original...I might have to invest in an attachment for my computer and see if I can scrounge up my parent's copy of the game. I'm definitely going to have to hit up Kyle for some articles - I think it's really interesting and I want to learn more!
I think this kind of activity might actually be really useful for an online class. I've noticed (even in my own grad classes) that actual engagement is really tough with the digital barriers we have to contend with. And an online activity as you've suggested might integrate really well with a class that is already online in its day-to-day activities, versus an in-person class that has something else grafted on top of it.
ReplyDeleteThere is the concern that some students won't have any familiarity interacting with digital spaces like this for any number of reasons. We don't want students struggling with how to make their avatar move if that gets in the way of whatever pedagogical purpose we had in the first place!
Hi, Lucas,
DeleteYes! I worry a lot about students not understanding technology, since this semester it sort of hit me like a brick in the face. I had to take a step back and think, "Alright, Mika, not everyone's dad works in IT. How can you make this easier for people who have never used technology like this before?" It meant that I had to create a lot of instructional videos, but ultimately, it's do-able. Especially if you can find instructional videos already on the web! Something I've been mulling over is whether or not to write out instructions and include pictures, since some people do better following those than a video, but I'm not sure how long it would take to make something like that.
Mika,
ReplyDeleteI find it really interesting that this brings up the conversation of how we present different personas whenever we write—most often the “academic” persona in the college situation, but in variations depending on what assignment or teacher and what we’re trying to get across. It’s a rhetorical element that’s sometimes students have a hard time grasping. This approach seems a great avenue for exploring themes of personal identity as well—though in daily life it’s usually a little more subtle than creating a whole alternate identity, this amped up version could make things easier to pinpoint and discuss. I like the idea as a whole in and of itself, but it seems even more perfect of a fit if you wanted to structure a class around identity themes.
There’s also the “fun” element as well, and even if students don’t fully latch onto the idea of fun in a learning environment (concerns Natalie and Shelbi raised), at least it’s something new and different that will hopefully stick in their memory. I have to keep reminding myself that resistance is not always a bad sign—sometimes it’s just a signal for growth and expanding horizons, which is often uncomfortable.
-Jessie
Hi, Jessie!
DeleteDefinitely! I mean, when I was younger I used a site called GaiaOnline a lot, and they basically had this program called "Towns," where you would go make your avatar run around and talk to people. People would often put on personas and pretend to be someone they weren't; I definitely pretended that I was MUCH older than I was. I love your idea about using something like that in class structured around identity themes, because I think the avatars we create in games like SIMS or GaiaOnline are who we want to be, not who we are, which tell us a lot about ourselves.