For my paper on integrating technology into instructional models, I want to look at three ways that technology can dovetail with strategies:
1. Technology can provide the structure for instructional models such as direct instruction, mastery learning, and simulations in the behavioral family. They can provide the structure for more student directed learning in the [...]

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Judi commented on my post Thinking About Rules. I asked if students would react differently to rules that were imposed from without rather than within:
“Good question. I suspect that this differs among learners ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äù that for some, having the rules imposed from outside is preferable, and for others, creating and following one?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s own rules is [...]

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Prensky, M. Digital game-based learning. New York: The McGraw-Hill Companies.
This book is Prensky’s introduction to games-based learning. Interesting overview of today’s gaming generation including the now famous idea about kids being digital natives. Plus, Prensky is the first person I’ve read who mentions Csikszentmihalyi and the state of “flow.” In terms of [...]

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The Learning Circuits Blog: Curious about the future of history based simulations?
Clark Aldrich makes the argument that the Star Trek video games are a good example for historical simulation developers. The material is similar and the Star Trek developers have chosen lots of different types of games to show their material. The [...]

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I have been poking around Marc Prensky’s Social Impact Games website, browing through the games. Many are just descriptions of games that are in development or that have been developed but are not free or web-based. For instance, in his book Prensky talks about The Monkey Wrench Conspiracy, a game used to teach [...]

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Judi commented on my post about Social Impact Games that one of the reasons Logo may not have taken off the way its developers would like is that “there were no ?¢‚Ǩ?ìrules?¢‚Ǩ? in the ways that learners usually thought of them.” In Turkle’s book, Second Self, she describes a girl who created her own [...]

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I finished Second Self this morning. Here’s my initial thought: my mantra when working with teachers has become that the computer is “just” a tool for learning. According to Turkle, it is much more than that: it’s a tool that supports your identity and indeed changes it. And since she [...]

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Thanks, Judi, for the link! This is the perfect site for someone like me who is interested in ways to incorporate gaming into learning. I have Marc Prensky’s book Game-Based Digital Learning on my shelf so it has just moved up in the priority list.
I poked around a few games and will [...]

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Petraglia, J. Reality by design: The rhetoric and technology of authenticity in education. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
This book has been on my shelf for some time. I don’t think I was ready for it, but it seems to be a natural next text for exploring the ideas I’ve been tinkering with [...]

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I feel like I was all over the place this week in terms of learning. I’ll try to do some summarizing and synthesizing before I fill out the weekly check in:
Judi commented on my post Just Stop It:
“So ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äù isn?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t that part of constructionist learning, also? Think about what you?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢re doing in this 3-week [...]

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