Researchers studying fantasy baseball and ‘competitive fandom’
After this press release climbed to one of the top stories on Yahoo last week, game and learning research has become fodder for a heated budget debate in Madison, WI. One state representative blasted the university for conducting research into such a topic and the GLS faculty have responded through the media this afternoon in the article: Fantasy baseball researchers to pol: It's not all fun and games.
I caught the following scene on my camera as an example of one form of learning at the GLS 2007 conference:
While this might not seem as thought provoking as the symposium by Henry Jenkins (btw if you have not seen the video library being created by the NML folks, it is worth spending some quality time to explore), the conversations that ensued by the participants in this video was every bit as rich as the questions asked in the more traditional lecture format. Being able to see top researchers in education in one room and duke it out as a Wii Boxer in another has created an interesting learning environment.
With close to 400 attendees, this is not a small gathering but the events and space are designed to create a sense of inclusiveness for the wide variety of participants.
This is my first GLS conference here in Madison and I am very impressed with the quality of the sessions and the conference organization. I have to admit a bias here because a number of folks from our ADL Co-Lab are helping to run the conference. One great aspect to this year’s conference is that more than 60 teachers have come to participate and are providing a real-world perspective to the sessions.
Some stream-of-consciousness thoughts:
So far this morning, in addition to getting meet with a wide variety people, I have participated in a fireside chat (complete with non-crackling TV Yule Log fire) related to the incorporation of games into online K-12 schools. This session was facilitated by The Co-Lab’s own flash/web/instructional developer Rick Horton and two of our partners from the Florida Virtual School. The conversation started with the semantics of “gaming” in an educational context. Do we call it games? Educational games? Or another term that removes the idea of “fun” from what we are trying to do. This is a common theme across government, corporate, and education advocates of learning games. The term “immersive learning” is perhaps a broader term that might be more acceptable to funders but will it turn the students away? I know these are real issues but we really have to move from this conversation O(fortunately the conversation did move to a deeply engaging exchange with the standing-room only “cozy” chat.
I slipped away to watch a “chat and frag” session with Muzzy Lane on their game Making (Your Own) History where participants were able to play Making History, which is an educational game that has been so successful is has moved into the commercial space as an entertainment game. Think: Civilization as a reference point for this game. At the end of the session time, it was hard to move people from the tables…engagement is working.