Probably the leading voice in how videogames model effective learning practices, James Paul Gee has written several books on the topic. Yet my introduction to him came through a short article titled, “Good Video Games and Good Learning,” in which he outlines 16 learning principles that videogames embody. Since then, I’ve read two of his books: What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy (in which he expands the list to 36 principles) and Good Videogames + Good Learning, and I can safely say that I’ve gotten far too close to his work to still judge it fairly. So I won’t even try.
Instead, I want to suggest that we can use Gee's principles as a way to measure the success of the methods and lesson plans discussed throughout the rest of this site. This isn’t as crazy as it sounds--I'm not suggesting that we judge one method by another because, despite appearances, Gee is not actually talking about using videogames in the classroom. He makes this absolutely clear:
“I know that many people who have read this book take it to be an argument for using games in schools or other education settings. However that is not the argument I have tried to make in this book. I have first wanted to argue that good video games build into their very designs good learning principles and that we should use these principles, with or without games, in schools, workplaces, and other learning sites. Second, I have wanted to argue that when young people are interacting with video games--and popular cultural practices--they are learning, and learning in deep ways” (What Video Games Have to Teach Us 215).
So, in judging the other these methods and applications according Gee’s theories, I am, in fact, only suggesting that we determine whether they are “good games,” and thus also whether they contain good learning principles. That being said, it is not my intent to relate the entirety of Gee’s theories (even listing and giving a brief definition of his 36 principles took him six pages). Instead I want to turn to a shorter list (in a shorter essay) that will give us more than enough for this introduction. If you want more, Gee’s work is an inviting and enjoyable read--well worth the time.
Gee's 13 Learning Principles
In “Good Games, the Human Mind, and Good Learning,” Gee once again sets out his argument for how videogames can be considered ideal models for learning environments. At the end of this essay, he lists 13 features of good games that translate cleanly to other environments. Rather than just naming and defining them, he clarifies the principle behind each, talks about how it works in games, gives examples of games that use it effectively, and finally discusses how it could be transferred to education.
Co-design: For a long time, people have argued that developers and players are, in fact, co-creating the game. As Gee says, “In video games, players make things happen. They don’t just consume what the “author” (game designer) has placed before them” (GVG + GL 30). In turn, he suggests that this co-design entails ownership.
Customize: This principle goes exactly against the grain of large-scale educational policies that try to fit all students into a single mold. Gee says, “Classrooms adopting this principle would allow students to discover their favored learning styles and try new ones without fear” (GVG + GL 31).
Identity: Particularly in role playing games, players take on an identity that is not their own. As they spend sometimes hundreds of hours inhabiting that identity, players certainly begin to care a lot about it. It is important here to also note that Gee talks about this topic more in “Learning and Identity” from : What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy, where he differentiates between three different identities at play which are basically the gamer, the character, and the relation between them (49-51). Gee says that identity is important to education because academic fields are not passive sets of facts, but “activities and ways of knowing through which facts are generated, defended, and modified” (GVG + GL 32).
Manipulation and Distributed Knowledge: This is to Gee’s call for “smart tools” in the classroom. He says, “humans feel expanded and empowered when they can manipulate powerful tools in intricate ways that extend their area of effectiveness” (GVG + GL 33). These tools become “smart” when they contain knowledge that the user does not--this distributes the knowledge between user and tool.
Well-Ordered Problems: In essence, this simply means that the most difficult and complex problems shouldn’t come first. Gee says, “Problem spaces can be designed to enhance the trajectory through which the learner traverses [any domain]. This does not mean leading the learner by the hand in a linear way. It means designing the problem space well” (GVG + GL 35).
Pleasantly Frustrating: Games that are too easy stop being interesting. Gee says, “Learning works best when new challenges are … felt by learners to be at the outer edge, but within, their ‘regime of competence’” (GVG + GL 36). Any use of videogames in a classroom would have to pay attention to this principle so that the work wasn’t too hard for some and too easy for others.
Cycles of Expertise: “Expertise is formed in any area by repeated cycles of learners practicing skills until they are nearly automatic, then having those skills fail in ways that cause the learners to have to think again and learn anew” GVG + GL 37). Combined with the other principles, this would suggest that classroom use of videogames, in order to remain pleasantly frustrating, would have to introduce new challenges at the right time.
Information “On Demand” and “Just in Time:” Since learning is best achieved when information is situated, Gee suggests that having all of the information at once (in the form of an instruction manual or handbook) isn’t as useful as when the information is tailored to the situation GVG + GL 38). This is most often achieved through game tutorials.
Fish tanks: Fish tanks are simplified ecosystems, “stressing a few key variables and their interactions” (GVG + GL 39). This will become particularly important when dealing with simulations in the classroom--any glimpse of a professional discourse might need to be simplified at first.
Sandboxes: “Sandboxes in the real world are safe havens for children that still look and feel like the real world” (GVG + GL 39). The basic idea is to give students a place to experiment while they learn. Some simulation games feature sandbox modes that can’t be lost, but instead allow free play.
Skills as Strategies: Gee says that for learning to occur, learners need to see skills primarily as means of obtaining an end so that they will feel the need to practice to the point of expertise (GVG + GL 40). This problematic relationship with skill sets is apparent in composition classrooms where students see certain lessons (like the use of rhetorical moves) as meaningless requirements rather than new ways of working.
System Thinking: Gee warns that “players can not view games as ‘eye candy,’ but must learn to use each game (actually each genre of game) as distinctive semiotic systems affording and discouraging certain sorts of actions and interactions” (GVG + GL 42). We will also return to this idea when thinking about game use in the classroom as a whole.
Meaning as Action Image: “For human beings the comprehension of texts and the world is ‘grounded in perceptual simulations that prepare agents for situated action” (GVG + GL 43). Here, in the final principle, we finally get the full idea of situated learning--that knowledge is not built through dictionary definitions or rules, but through active use and reconstruction.
Overall, even this shortened version of Gee’s principles give us a good range of strategies for looking at game use in the classroom. In the sections that follow, they will be applied to both the methods and applications to hopefully discover a reliable way forward.
Works Cited
Gee, James Paul. “Good Video Games and Good Learning.” Phi Kappa Phi Forum 85.2 (2005): 33–37. Print.
---. Good Video Games + Good Learning. 1st ed. Peter Lang Publishing, 2007. Print.
---. What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy. Second Edition: Revised and Updated Edition. Macmillan, 2007. Print.
Also worth attention is Gee's blog