Consolarium

I love watching the Grand Prix so it will be no surprise to learn I also love Mario Kart for the Wii.  I could see an opportunity here for a great context for learning so I was delighted that Head Teacher, Gillian Penny at Gavinburn Primary School could also see the potential and was happy to trial it for me with a P5 class.

I visited on June 18th and class teacher Lorna McNicol had done a great job.  The P5 classroom was festooned with pieces of writing, maths and art work all arising out of the context facilitated by Mario Kart.  When I arrived the children were busy rehearsing advertisements about an up and coming racing championship. Later on these were captured on the computer complete with sound effects and music, ready to be burnt to CD to take home as a memento of the project, all done with the help of a P7 tutor. Nice to see ICT permeating through the learning!

The children had been organised into seven kart teams of four. The teams competed on Mario Kart and a championship had been created out of that. All the teams had names – Killer Karts, Wheels on Fire, Mega Mushrooms – and everyone had their own name badge.  Team logos and pod stickers for their karts had also been designed. 

Writing: Each kart team comprised a driver, a mechanic, a press agent and a manager and they had written biographies about imaginary characters who are drivers, mechanics etc.  The children had interviewed each other in role as their imaginary characters and produced an account of that interview.  They had drafted letters to a company asking for sponsorship and had also written reports about an accident at the race track.  Lorna explained that drama had been used where ever possible to help with the writing process. She said that it had really helped the boys in particular to be immersed in this imaginary world with the visual aspect of the game helping them with a starting point for writing activities.  One boy said, “ I don’t like writing but I liked writing The Accident Report.  We had pictures of a racing car accident and imagined that we were there and of course we have crashes when we play Mario Kart!”

Maths: Problem solving in maths fitted easily into this context with opportunities to calculate fuel consumption, speed and costs.  The children had looked at decimal places for lap timing using a model race track and had also investigated the cost of flights and accommodation to visit a Grand Prix location.

Art and Design: Logos had been designed, karts made from junk material, suits designed for racing drivers and a crowd scene witnessing the crash had been created.

Next week, the plan was to focus on Science and some of the science teachers from the secondary school were coming to get involved in the investigation of friction, air resistance, stream lining and water and fire proof materials in the classroom.  Great – and an opportunity for cross sector working too!!

Lorna is a probationary teacher and this is her first experience of games – based learning and she has been delighted with the enthusiasm and motivation that the children have shown. The children were obviously still motivated, energetic and excited and were producing work of high quality – and there was only a week to go before the holidays!!   Lorna has been enthusiastically sharing her experiences with other probationary teachers which is great news.

Much more had been planned for the project, but the end of term was looming.  Drama, music, animation, web design and a trip to a kart track will all be on the agenda next time they run the project….(and Gillian says they will definitely be doing it again….!)

Being involved with and leading the games based learning initiatives with the Consolarium is great fun but it is also a great experience in terms of meeting teachers who take some of our ideas forward and then really make the realisation of such projects their own. We are finding that in doing so, these teachers are setting the standard for the use of some of the games. Names that immediately spring to mind in this regard include Kim Aplin and subsequently Ollie Bray with Guitar Hero and Anna Rossvoll, Ruth McDonald and Michelle Law with Nintendogs as well as many others who have taken this on and extended the practice of the appropriate integration of computer games into teaching and learning. I’d now like to add another name to this list and introduce Margaret Young to everyone. A teacher at Port of Mentieth PS near Stirling Margaret has been using Moshi Monsters with her P.1 - P.3 class. I wrote about Moshi Monsters a wee while back due to my interest being stirred when I watched my wee girls using it last summer. It reminded me of Nintendogs in the way it replicated much of what that game does in terms of looking after a virtual creature: ensuring it was healthy and happy as well as managing a budget. However, Moshi Monsters has problem solving, early literacy and numeracy tasks all embedded into the game play as well as the facility to introduce social networking to children via a friends finder and a noticeboard.  However, this game was freely available (although an enhanced experience via subscription is now on offer) and can be used by anyone that has an computer with an internet connection.

I have been working on ways in which we could try an extended pilot for Moshi Monsters but while I have been doing that Margaret Cassidy, ICT Development Officer in Stirling decided to try it out with one of her teachers. She introduced the idea to Margaret Young at Port of Menteith PS and since the initial presentation of the idea the most fantastic set of associated rich learning tasks has just flourished.

I had the great pleasure of visiting the class last Wednesday morning and within 5 minutes I was captivated and enchanted by what I was seeing and hearing and I found myself like a child in a sweet-shop in terms of not knowing where to look in terms of the quality learning that was happening.

I had a discussion with Margaret about how she got involved in the project, how she managed it and what added value she feels it has brought to learning in her class and to her continuing professional development.

The game at the heart of the learning experience
The most prevalent method that we employ in our Consolarium initiatives usually involves the game becoming the contextual hub about which learning experiences are planned for and presented to the children. This gives the teacher the freedom and flexibility to combine curricular areas and present learning tasks via the creation of a collaborative story or a process of enquiry. The flexibility of such an approach allows the teacher to accommodate any ideas and questions that come from the children as a result of their experiences and interests arising from the learning tasks. This is exactly what Margaret has done with Moshi. as from the following examples you will see that the game really became the beating heart of the rich learning in the class.

Writing
Very many contexts for writing were facilitated by the game. These included writing adverts to sell your Moshi Monster’s house, writing to explain the desing of flags made to represent Monstro City as well as news flashes about what has been happening in Monstro City itself. I was particularly impressed by the idea of making a tourist information leaflet for visitors to refer to if they were planning a visit to Monstro City. Have a look at how the teacher did this:

…and have a look at some their adverts:

Talking and listening
An engaging debate was cultivated in the classroom when the question of whether or not the children should allow new building work to be permitted on Flutterby Fields: a beautiful fun place to be in Monstro City.  The teacher talked about the development of the children’s thinking and their ability to consider and reflect on opposing points of view in this task and even how some children changed their minds as a result of the discussions and arguments put forward by their peers.

Encouraging problem solving in maths
In order to function in the game you must visit the Hall of Puzzles. This is packed full of puzzles that engagement with rewards you with Rox, the currency in Monstro City. The more Rox you have then the more you can spend in the various shops that you can visit. The puzzles are particularly engaging and the children were all very keen to tell me what their high scores were at many of the different puzzle that are available. The teacher has worked with the children to set up the Hall of Puzzles in the class. This became a really appealing ‘den’ in the classroom for the children to visit and explore a range of puzzles and games with each other. Have a look at how this was done:

Design and Technology
The children were asked to think about what kind of shops should be in Monstro City. These ideas were then brought to reality as the children made their own models of their shops from card, paper and other materials.  Have a look:

Animation
Children are naturally creative. They have ideas. One of the superb aspects of learning with ICT is that it gives young learners the vehicle through which they can express their creativity and ideas and in doing so develop their ICT skills set. They can also have a positive impact on planning, presentation and awareness of audience. Here we have one example of a stop motion animation created by two 6 year old children. Just look at what they can do….

They also used Crazy Talk to bring to life their Monster characters that had been created in Art & Design.

All of these videos can be viewed at our Consolarium Blip TV channel.

Keeping connected and being safe
One of the benefits of using this resource is that children can keep connected. One child in this class spends six months of the year in Scotland and six months in New Zealand. Currently in her antipodean abode she can keep in touch with the class via her noticeboard. As Moshi Monsters is freely available to anyone (see their safety policy) there is an issue in terms of ensuring that the children are not exposed to any inappropriate contact. The teacher and the class decided to use a special code for the duration of the project and this meant that they could only accept a friend request if this code was in the name of the person requesting to make friends. This meant that the community was kept to the classroom and any worries about unknown people becoming involved with the children in the classroom context were fully addressed.

There has been some concern about children wanting to play with their Moshi Monster for far too long at home. Incentives to jump up the levels and to ensure that your Monster is happy and healthy in the game play need to be maintained and balanced in terms of appropriate time spent on the game. Lessons need to be learned about what the Consolarium can do to ensure that parents are fully informed about such initiatives, what benefits they can bring to their child’s learning but also what the school and the home need to do to ensure that children understand that too much of one thing is not necessarily good for them.  Everything in moderation is a lesson that we can help children learn.

Maybe Moshi Monsters also need to consider ways in which children can withdraw from the game for periods of time without their lack of engagement with their monster leading to its demise! Something akin to the ‘dog hotel’ in Nintendogs wouldn’t go amiss here.

A delightful time at Port of Menteith was most certainly had by me. Rich learning, happy and motivated children, innovative teachers and a Headteacher willing to allow informed risks with new ideas and approaches in the use of ICT and games, in this example, to happen in his school.

Superb stuff and very many thanks to all at Port of Mentieth PS and Stirling Council for enabling such innovative work to take place. Now, how do I make an extended study of this work….?

Hello, I’m Kim Aplin.  I’ve been working in the Consolarium with Derek Robertson since January.  I was interested to read in The Times today that Scottish children are falling behind in science because they see science as ‘uncool’.  Well this certainly was not the case at Meldrum School last week where children had been investigating friction and gravity and excited by their learning!….. 

Kororinpa at Meldrum School: The project is now in full swing in P5.  I was very pleased to see how enthusiastic and excited the children and their teacher, Hazel Sim, were about their whole learning experience. The work that had been done with the game involved the investigation of friction and the designing of the class marble run. The game had been used to analyze what they could incorporate into their designs for their marble runs.   The class have worked together to create a wall mounted run that they are immensely proud of.

[ltsflash intranet/Newsround]

Watch the CBBC Newsround report from an Aberdeen school showcasing how its using games-based learing across the curriculum to encourage game designers in the future.

Forget the Rolling Stones, who needs Radiohead and as for Metallica…get out of here, because you’ve got to get ready for the new rock gods of the 21st Century: Full Moon. They are just about to release their new CD called Pure Black Magic and a European Tour is about to begin! Get your tickets as soon as you can because this outfit are the real deal…

…well really they’re not. Full Moon are a virtual band created by the children of P.7 in Oldmeldrum PS in Aberdeenshire. The band members are Tasha Hooch, Charlie Andrews, Lavender Dorset, Scrambled Egg Sam and Carmen Jackal. These characters came to life through a fantastic project that happened in a P.7 class in Oldmeldrum PS.

This project arose as a result of Aberdeenshire Council’s engagement with the Consolarium. It involved the use of a game for the Sony PS2 (and Xbox 360) called Guitar Hero II. This game allows you to engage with the world of rock and roll by using a plastic guitar that lets you pretend to be a rock star performing on stage! You’ve got to see, and play, this in order to appreciate what a tremendous game it is.

However, the fact that this is a great game is neither here nor there if it can’t be applied in teaching and learning contexts. Well, Kim Applin (the P.7 teacher), saw potential in this as a cross-curricular tool and she came up with an array of rich tasks that really exemplify how a Curriculum for Excellence can occur in the classroom. A detailed case study of the project can be found via this link so have a look to find out more about what happened.

The reason for this post is to commend the presentation about this project at the Scottish Learning Festival ‘07. Anna Rossvoll (or should that be Anna ‘Rocks’voll by the look of this picture) delivered an inspiring and innovative presentation that beautifully captured the essence of what the teacher called an unbelievably high quality learning experience for the children. This is a presentation that needs to be shared with a wider and larger audience.

She actually brought the PS2 and the Guitar Hero game so that two willing players could have a go in the session. Now, I love this game and have become quite good at rattling up the combos and hitting the high scores but I have an understudy who is fast becoming my main rival for the crown of best guitar hero player in Scottish Education…Margaret Cassidy from Stirling Council.

We had a go at the game and lo and behold, when we paused it , in order not to take up too much of Anna’s time, it just so happened that I was in the lead. better luck next time Margaret! The delegates were on their feet as they were so enthralled in the musical masterclass that they were witnessing but sadly, we had to call it a day. However, we are available for birthdays, retirements and bar mitzvahs.;-)

To finish, what a session this was! Bursting with life, energy, innovation and fun. It goes to show what can be done when teachers are given the opportunity to develop and lead learning contexts that they believe will work with their class. Very well done to pupils, teachers and ICT staff involved in making this happen.