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Handheld Learning 2008: Games Based Learning in Secondary Schools

I took part in the Spotlight Scotland Session at the Handheld Learning 2008 Conference in London earlier in the week. I had been asked to talk about Games Based Learning in Secondary Schools and some of the great work that we have going on in Musselburgh Grammar School and East Lothian.

I have embedded the slides from my presentation (using slideshare) below. As with my normal presentations I like to use a lot of slides with not a lot of content on each!

Making Games Based Learning Work in Secondary Schools

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: ltscotalnd olliebray)

The links that I referred to in my presentation are as follows:

• Wordle – Create fantastic Word Clouds to brighten up your lessons!
• Promethean Active Expression – A world class Interactive Voting System.

Some examples of web based games that can be used for home learning:

• Classic Sim City – Useful for teaching about towns, cities and settlement.
• Ordnance Survey Map Games – Good for homework.
• Fantasy Famer – Manage a farm for a year
• Stop Disasters Simulator – Can you protect the world against floods, volcanoes, earthquakes and other nasty stuff?
• Sim Sweat Shop – What is it really like working in a sweat shop in a less economically developed country?
• An idea for setting web based games for homework activities

 

Games Based Learning to help Transition between Primary to Secondary Education:

• The Musselburgh Grammar School Guitar Hero Transition Project – Background Information and Timeline
• MGS Guitar Hero Transition Project – Part Two: The Virtual Battle of the Bands
• Guitar Hero Showcase: I love it when a plan comes together!
• Musselburgh Guitar Hero Project Features in the Times Educational Supplement
• Cluster Project that plays to all talents.
• SLF 2008: Enriched Assessment for Enriched Enquiry

 

Partnership with Parents:

• Internet Safety and Responsible Use: How to set family settings on games consoles

 

The Use of the Nintendo DS:

Titles we use:

• Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training: How Old Is Your Brain?
• Big Brain Academy
• Hotel Dusk – A Graphic Novel

 

Titles we are currently evaluating:

• Maths Training
• My Word Coach

 

The Use of the Nintendo Wii

Titles we use:

• Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree (currently being used in SfL)
• Endless Ocean (Context for Learning)
• Wii Sports
• Dancing Stage
• My French Coach

Titles we are currently evaluating:

• My Word Coach

ConnectEd have made a fantastic storage solution for the PSP – hopefully they will also soon have one on the market for the Nintendo DS.

 

Other Graphic Novel Links:

• Classical Comics
• Manga Shakespeare

The use of the Play Station:

We are currently using Buzz the Schools Quiz and are looking forward to evaluation Buzz the Hollywood Quiz as soon as we get a copy? I am sure that there will also be Education Version of Buzz for the PS3 coming out at some point?

Games Design

We have a site licence for Mission Maker and will be exploring the possibilities for using this game to develop literacy and International links over the next 12 months.

Other Links:

• Learning and Teaching Scotland Consolarium
• Learning and Teaching Scotland
• Ideas Network Scotland: Innovation and Development in Education
• Zig Zag Dance Mats

East Lothian Celebrating Success: learning through play

Today was the East Lothian Celebrating Success.

We made a decision to exhibit as the Musselburgh cluster, which I believe is a sign of our continued commitment to the development of cluster growth and to the emerging 3-18 curriculum. The theme of our exhibition was ‘Learning through Play’.

One of the sections of the display was all of the work that we have been doing as a Cluster on Computer Games and New Technology in Education. Our exhibition space included:

• The Musselburgh Cluster Guitar Hero Transition Project
• The use of the PSP in education
• DoBe’s in Education
• Games Design and Creative Writing
• How we are using the Nintendo Wii
• Buzz the schools Quiz
• The use of the Nintendo DS

It was great to be able to introduce some of the children that attended the afternoon to some of this new technology and also a great opportunity to spread the word within East Lothian.

 

Skype for PSP

At the recent Consumer Electronics Association (CES) tradeshow in the US, Sony announced that Skype is coming for the PSP (although it will only be available for the PSP Lite). This is great news for all PSP users who like to use their PSP to browse the Internet and could add an extra interesting dimension to our East Lothian Campie Primary PSP project.  

The will be a new headset available for the PSP when Skype is released in the next firmware up-date sometime next month.

Via Gizmodo.

East Lothian ICT Evaluation

I was going to post this last night but for some reason my Orange / Wanado Broadband is not working at the moment? Anyone else having problems?

Anyway, I was at a meeting yesterday afternoon that was the initial stage of an evaluation project for all of the ICT work that we have been doing in East Lothian. EduBuzz, Teachmeet Roadshows and our recent work with computer games are all likely to come under the spotlight. I’m hoping that Musselburgh will get its name mentioned a few time – hopefully as an example of good practice.

PSP's In Education

We are about to start a project looking at using Sony PSP’s in Education. One of the programmes that we are going to be looking at is ‘Hot Brain’ this is another brain training game similar to some of the games already available for the DS. I’ve had one and have been playing Hot Brain for nearly a week now and I like how the game works. Here’s what the instructions say,

‘Fire up your mind with Hot Brain™, a game that engages the mind through a series of puzzles and challenges designed to raise the activity and temperature of your brain. Hot Brain presents challenging and fun mental activities that help ignite your mind in areas like logic, memory, math, language and concentration. Exclusive to the PSP® (PlayStation® Portable) system, the game allows you to test your skills in several single player modes or you can play with up to three people via ad-hoc connection. Whether you're an expert or a beginner, a robust tutorial mode makes the game accessible and enjoyable to people of all ages.’

I really like the high quality graphics and high usability of the game, I do however miss the interactivity that the stylus provides with the Nintendo DS.

 

One advantage of the PSP is that you can hook it up to a data projector or a television, this will make the demonstrating the game a lot easier in the classroom.I’m also interested to see how we might use the PSP’s in Education for other activities as well as brain training. They have the ability to access the Internet, play audio and nifty camera attachment allows you to take photographs. I’m not to keen on the interface to enter text on the PSP but you can also get compatible keyboard, which would mean that you would be able to use the PSP more like a computer. This combined with online publishing such as Google Doc’s adds another exciting dimension to the project.

More information on this soon.