Consolarium

November 29th, 2009

Wee Musicians performing with Wii Music

Derek Robertson

Comments: 2 Comments » Tags: Tags: Consolarium, educational games, game based learning, games based learning, LTS, Nintendo, Wii
 : Categories Aberdeenshire, Consolarium, Nintendo

Years ago, when TV was a source for the collective conscious, I remember sitting down with my folks to watch the Generation Game on BBC1. The willing contestants were always presented with challenging and nonsensical tasks to try out and one that sticks in my mind involved handbell ringing!

Somehow a visit to a school in Peterhead last week to see a game based learning initiative that used Wii Music brought that memory back to me as I watched groups of children swing their wiimotes and nunchunks in a campanology stylee but in so doing they really were ringing the bell for game based learning in schools…

I was contacted by Jonathan Cordiner from the Aberdeenshire Glow team some time ago to be informed about the work that he was doing with Esther Clark and her P.6 class from Buchanhaven PS in Peterhead using the game Wii Music for the Nintendo Wii. Now Wii Music involves a number of games that encourage you to ‘jam’ with the Miis on screen and in so doing play various instruments and learn a surprising amount about music.

When I mentioned the potential of learning about music through this game to some people they did not initially think that standing in front of a screen waving a game controller up and down or side to side could have any real substance or add value to learners experience in this area. Having visited the class and seeing what they have done for myself I can’t help saying just how incredible the skilled and informed use of this resource has been and just what a tremendous impact this has had on the learners in this class.

What have they been learning?

The first thing that struck me when I met the class was just again how excited and motivated the children were to show what they had been doing and to demonstrate their new skills.

For me the educational ethos in a class is so important if children are to be engaged by learning and here we saw a class bursting with enthusiasm, industry, skills and knowledge of their subject. I saw:

• Groups of children accompanying the Miis with various vitual instruments in the game to perfectly perform a selection of songs
• Children learning about the role and responsibility of the orchestra conductor and showing their skills in conducting the Wii orchestra
• Children moving away from the game to play ‘real’ instruments in order to play the songs they had performed within the game
• Children talking confidently and knowledgeably about the range of musical instruments AND musical notation
• Children performing their own ringtones that were created using a pentatonic scale
• Children using Glow to share their work and to engage with tasks set bu the teacher in Glow Learn (and to perform at an international education conference go to 30mins)
• Class displays about various composers and the different genres of music there are

Above all I saw learning happening in a classroom bursting with life. We have videoed a lot of the work that the children have been doing but is just at the edit stage but have a quick look at some of the work that the children have done about the composers that they investigated:

Yet again we see how a game built for entertainment can prove to be such a rich source for learning when used by skilled and thoughtful teachers who know how to use game based learning in order to create the appropriate context and climate in which rich learning can thrive. There have been many requests to the Aberdeenshire Glow team for the plans that were used for this project. These can be accessed here:

Aberdeenshire Council’s Wii Music plans

This project was a sheer delight to see and many congratulations must go to Jonathan and Esther for their imaginative and thorough approach, an approach that has made this initiative such a success.

November 25th, 2009

Manga High

Brian Clark

Comments: 3 Comments » Tags: Tags: cfe, games based learning, glasgow, mangahigh, mathematics, maths, Numeracy, online
 : Categories Consolarium, Numeracy

Hello, World!

First of all, let me introduce myself. I am Brian Clark- new Development Officer at the Consolarium. I am Principal Teacher of Computing at Portobello High School in Edinburgh and have just started this Games Based Learning secondment with LTS.

Day 1 (well, day 2 actually)

First job took me to the Manga High training day at the Savoy Centre in Glasgow with my esteemed colleague, and fellow DO, Mr Brian McLaren. We spent the morning with 10 Glasgow based maths teachers who are going to pilot Manga High in their schools.

The Manga High team have developed a series of games for the 10-16 age group that requires the application of mathematical concepts from the first click of the ‘Play Now’ button. It is one of the first games based learning tools I have seen that really challenges pupils of all abilities, and, importantly, it is presented in a modern, accessible and flash based format that regular users of miniclip.com are familiar with.

“Mangahigh’s unique game-based learning system brings out the mathematician in ALL students who love games.”

Let The Games Begin

Here are a few of the games that we were introduced to ….

Flower Power

The maths team take on an ordering game. Can you do better? How much can you harvest? How much can you make?
It’s amazing how the quickly contest hotted up! Try it yourself.

Ice Ice Baby

It’s all about estimation! Guess correctly, or should I say, guess as close to the correct answer as you can, and you can save our little Antartician friends! Save the peguins!

These are just 2 examples of the activites MangaHigh have created. You can try all the games here.

But, that’s not all…

So, the games themselves require application of maths from the beginning (did you try the Pyramid Panic game? Wow! Talk about real problem solving with real maths), but what makes MangaHigh an exciting development is Prodigi.

Prodigi provides lessons and questions based on the ability of the pupils. The questions are generated based on how well pupils perform in the games. This can all be monitored by the teacher using the Analytics tool. More detailed information can be found here.

The Pilot Schools

The 10 Glasgow schools invovled in the pilot are developing impelmentation strategies for various year groups. Some of the ways the schools are planning to use Manga High include :

• setting homework
• teaching a new mathematical concept
• revision and reinforcement of taught concepts
• a tool to increase motivation in class

What was really encouraging to hear was that the maths staff were discussing the application of MangaHigh at all stages from S1 up to Higher. There was also great discussion about how to implement MangaHigh a classroom that did not have 20+ computers. One great idea was to use an interactive whiteboard and an electronc voting system - really looking forward to following that particular implementation up!

In terms of CfE, there are so many specific outcomes this games based approach to maths covers. There are the obvious links to the Numeracy Accross Learning and Mathematics outcomes. Also, within Technologies, it tackles many of the outomes that focus on ICT to Enhance Learning.

Brian McL and I will be following each schools implementation of this over the coming weeks and will update you on their experiences.

November 5th, 2009

Highland Tour

bmclaren

Comments: 14 Comments » Tags:  : Categories Highland, Literacy, cross-curricular

Over the last 3 days I have been visiting schools in Highland Region with whom we will be working over the coming months. The enthusiasm and hospitality from everyone I met was brilliant and nothing, I’m sure, to do with the hardware and software that goes with the project!( although one school did take great delight in calling me “wii man”)

My journey took me just over 600 miles and 3 days from Castletown, just outside Thurso to Alvie, just outside Aviemore, via Dornoch, Dingwall and Merkinch in Inverness. Every school was different in many ways (in fact one school had almost twice as many primary sevens as another had pupils) and served a wide range of catchments; but everyone showed a real commitment to embracing technology to enhance learning and teaching and were in no doubt to the impact it might have on their children. I am really looking forward to working with the schools over the coming months and will post regular updates on our progress.

November 1st, 2009

Game Based Learning in Scottish schools survey

Derek Robertson

Comments: none Tags: Tags: Consolarium, game based learning, LTS
 : Categories Uncategorized

As part of the work that the Consolarium has done in the field of game based learning and more importantly the significance of the reference to games design in the CfE Technology outcomes LTS is in the early stages of an initiative that aims to develop the capacity for the development of a games design community via Glow. As part of this work are carrying out this survey that we hope will help us outline the current landscape about the use and spread of games based learning in Scottish schools. To this end we have worked with Scottish Screen and the Abertay University to create two questionnaires: one for teachers and one for pupils. We are hoping that responses from both questionnaires will give us a clearer picture of the spread of games based learning and some attitudes to it.

Teacher questionnaire
Closing date for this questionnaire is Friday 20th November. It should not take more than 5-10 mins to complete.

Pupil questionnaire
Closing date for this questionnaire is Friday 11th December. It should not take more than 5-10 mins to complete.

There is the added incentive for pupils to participate by the possibility of winning a Nintendo DSi. The following link also contains text that addresses the issue of safety in relation to children’s participation with this survey.

We fully appreciate that GBL in schools is hapening in many places outside of Scotland but this survey is aimed only at Scottish pupils and Scottish schools. We would greatly appreciate as many responses as possible to so please share it with as many people as you can.

Our results will be shared with the wider community once we have had time to collate and analyse them.

Thanking you in advance for your participation and support with this.