Double Entry Journal #12

1. What is the main argument the author is making in Chapter 5?
The main argument the author is making is this chapter is the issue of learning and video games.  How video games can help or increase learning of the person playing the game. 

2. What constitutes a theory of learning?
Gee says, "Learning is not infinitely variable and there are patterns and principles to be discovered-patterns and principles that ultimately constitute a theory of learning. Indeed, what I am offering her is a case study meant to offer suggestions for a theory of how deep learning works". Therefore, patterns and principles constitute a theory of learning.

3. Why did the author struggle to learn to play Warcraft III? What needs to proceed before good learning principles?
Gee struggled to learn to play Warcraft III because, "I failed to engage with it in a way that fully recruited its solid design and learning principles".  Gee says, "So something has to come even before good learning principles.  What has to come before is motivation for an extended engagement with the game". 

4. How would have the authors struggle with learning to play Warcraft III been interpreted in school?
His struggle with learning to play the game would equal failure in a school setting.  Failing the game would also result in a low or failing grade.  The author would also give up, if this were to be in a school setting, because he had failed and would not be motivated to try again. 

5. What kind of learning experience might be better suited for at-risk students?
A horizontal learning experience would be better suited for at-risk students.  Gee says, "'Horizontal' learning experiences are those where one does not make a lot of progress up the ladder of skills, but stays on the initial rungs awhile, exploring them and getting to know what some of the rungs are and what the ladder looks like".

6. Why does the school-based interpretation of "at-risk" lead to bad learning?
Gee says, "This is all 'at-risk' needs to mean in schools too, though there it often means giving 'at-risk' learners a special dumbed-down curriculum meant to catch them up on 'basic skills'- a curriculum that all too often is a bad learning experience for these students". 

7. What do schools need to do to function more like a good game?
According to Gee, "When students are learning a content area in school- such as some area of science- this domain could be seen as a special world of its own: the world of doing science in a certain way and acting with certain values. In this case, school would be functioning more like a good game than traditional schooling which stresses knowledge apart from action and identity". Students could pretend to be zoologists and explore different ecosystems or become actual scientists and perform experiments that the person would actually do. This would make the learning experience a real-life situation and would be like a "good game" also.

8. What is different about how good games and school assess learners?
In a school setting, students are assessed by taking a test or completing an assignment and then the teacher decides for the learner how they can fix the problems that they are having. Also, the teacher decides what learning style is best for each student.  Good games assess learners by letting the person playing the game decide for themselves what topics they know or do not know and what learning style suits them best. 

9. What are the attributes of a fish-tank tutorial that make it an effective learning tool? How is it different than school-based learning?
Gee says, "I will call this a "fish-tank tutorial", because a fish tank can be, when done right, a simplified environment that lets one appreciate an ecosystem (e.g. a river, a pond, or reef in the ocean) by stripping away a good deal of complexity, but keeping enough to bring out some basic and important relationships". Information is given in print, orally, and visually. Gee says, "Information is always given "just in time" when it can be used and we can see its meaning in terms of effects and actions. Unlike in school, we don't get lots of verbal information up front and then have to remember it all when we can actually use it much later."

10. What is a sand-box tutorial? Why is it effective? How is it different than school-based learning?
A sand-box tutorial is a place where the player is free to explore, try new things, take risks, and make new discoveries and nothing bad will happen. Sand-box tutorial is effective because the learners are free to explore, but also they have the help of a supervised game if they need extra help. It is different than school-based learning because learners can "fail" because they don't want to explore or take risks because of the risk of failure.

11. What is genre? Why is it important for good learning?
"Genre just means what type of thing something is: for example, whether a novel is a mystery romance, science fiction, etc., or a piece of writing is a story, report, essay, and so forth." "Good learning always involves knowing early and well what type of thing we are being asked to learn and do. Learners need to see this type of thing in action, not to be given static rules, if they are really to understand."

12. According to the author, what does learning and play have in common?
Gee says, "For humans, real learning is always associated with pleasure and is ultimately a form of play- a principle almost always dismissed by schools."

13. How are the skills tests in good games different from skills tests in school?
According to Gee, "The skill tests are, as they often are not in school, developmental for the learner and not evaluative (judgments carried out by authority figures). Furthermore, they are tests of what skills mean as strategies, not decontextualized tests of skills outside contexts of application where they mean quite specific things."

14. How does RoN support collaborative learning?
RoN supports a collaborative learning environment because people can go to websites or blogs based upon a shared activity, interests, and goals.  Gee says, "The many websites and publications devoted to RoN create a social space in which people can, to any decree they wish, small or large, affiliate with others to share knowledge and gain knowledge that is distributed and dispersed across many different people, places, Internet sites, and modalities." 

15. Match at least one learning principle of good games (pg.74) with each of the following learning theorists you have studied in 3352:

Dewey: 22) They allow learners to practice enough so that they routinize their skills and then challenge them with new problems that force them to re-think these taken-for-granted skills and integrate them with new ones.  Repeat. 
Vygotsky: 12) They offer supervised fish tank tutorials.
Piaget: 5) They let learners themselves assess their previous knowledge and learning styles and make decisions for themselves (with help)
Gardner: 14) They give information via several modes (e.g. in print, orally, visually). They create redundancy.
Bandura: 1) They create motivation for an extended engagement