Forgive me if this is muddled and half assed (ha! oh well, time doesn't allow better thinking, there is enough controversial material in the book to wax eloquent for a long long time). Gee and video gaming. First impressions, I feel like Gee's book What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy is really a longwinded and half assed attempt to justify video games a meaningful learning environment. Certainly he puts forth a lot of very well thought out notions...but I think he may be wrong in the end. I have no doubt that games have something to teach us about learning, I totally agree with Gee when he makes "The claim that there really is no such thing as learning 'in general'. We always learn something. And that something is always connected, in some way, to some semiotic domain or other." 22 And I do think that in more ways than one video games are a cultural product of the age of the image and the computer. But, in terms of the premise of the book (which I may have misinterpreted), I think Gee set out with his learning theories at the forfront and is just making video games another object to bow to his theories, not that he is allowing video games to direct his thinking about learning, which is what he made it sound like he was setting out to do.
On a more positive note, perhaps video games, ones made with parrallels to real life have more potential for changing the way we think about the world and the forces that control it, rather than they are educational. Gee's analysis of Deus Ex made me think of this, as he talked about battling terrorists, only to discover that you are the terrorist etc working for a few rich elitists. Maybe video games allow people to be more critical and healthfully paranoid about the world.
Narrative-wise: Gee makes the argument that video games, unlike books and movies, provide players with the ability to create their own story. In books and movies "the reader or viewer knows someone else (the "author") has determined the order in which events in the story will be encountered." 81 I believe he is trying to make parallels to free will and choice, actually creating your own story or narrative. But, are not video game programmers just authors in another sense? Are they not meta authors, writing at a level far above that of say, a book author and providing some semblance of free will by allowing the player to create his or her own path?
A random point I liked: Gee says in games, unlike, say in school learning, there is a price to be paid for not thinking at the action specific level. This is true, each action in a game leads to a direct consequence, often drastic ones like dying. But, I am not convinced this matters very, as most games start you over immediately to the previous place you saved, the immediate consequences are replaced by immediate chances to to things differently, almost to the point that you do something differently WITHOUT thinking very much about it. Reaction verses action?
Despite everything that I think may be wrong with this book (like that a lot of it seems like speculative philosophy of learning in which Gee takes a stab at justifying his midlife crisis/love for video games and actual analysis of what may be really going on in the learning of games), I must admit that a lot of my beliefs about video games come from my own experience...and that has often been that i've wasted a LOT of time playing them. I feel brain dead afterword, sucked of energy and yet i go back and play again, much like an addiction, the games never satisfy.
2 comments:
I wonder about the definition of learning I guess.
It seems undeniable that things are leanred from playing games..a whole range: form vocabulary to logic... geography etc. Perhaps the overarching question in my mind is what is the academic or even the real life value of the learning? This would vary widely from game to game I suspect.
Then, some of the underlying thigns which are learned seem to me potentially damaging, especially in the games where violence is a primary theme. I think the idea of learning that when you die to just click re-start is outright distrubing. That is unsettling in the cartoon Road Runnner... clealry a bird and a comic but the video games are so much more real. Evne if a pl;ayer doensl;t go so far as to eve rhtink life cna be simply re-started, I strongly suspect it impacts the player's psyche in some way that most people would not find constructive.
Weighing in again, as a therapist, I think the addictive nature of these games is also unsetttling; added to the fact that the majority of the time players seem frustrated and even angered (enraged??) by the constant challenges and setbacks. They are designed for you to fail so you keep on playing. I also question the value of learning experiences that are deisgned to make the learner fail repeatedly.
I agree with your basic critique, it does feel as if Gee has taken his view of learning and overlaid it on videogames, or more to the point, he has studied videogames from a learning theory lens. Saying this at the outset may have been a more honest introduction on his part. Nevertheless, it is an interesting exercise to think about the types of cognitive capacities that are exercised in playing videogames. Since Gee's learning theory framework has a distinctly sociocultural cast, we do miss out on studying the spatial awareness and visual acuity aspects of cognition that are clearly given a workout in these games.
The good thing about failing and getting a new chance is that people will, hopefully, realize that a different approach may be warranted in any number of situations, not just videogames (of course, tranfer is never guaranteed). Also, the idea that if one continues to work at the game, and one develops strategies to play the game, one can beat the game, is a powerful one -- effort is rewarded. These games are extremely intricate puzzles that engage several of the senses at once, they are, therefore, entirely engrossing. It is no wonder people find them addictive. Someone could do a very interesting multimodal analysis of videogaming.
Post a Comment