The game I chose was Magical Capitals, which focused on language arts skills; more specifically, the use of capitalization. It was a simple game with simple instructions: Click the letter in which you think should be capitalized. Some pros I experienced were that it was very user-friendly. It was colorful, the music was nice, and age-appropriate for the most part. Immediate feedback was given and for every answer you got right, a new character popped up. I thought this was a fun way to reward children, in a way, for their correct answers. I did find a few cons about the game as well. Whenever you got the wrong answer, the fairy would get mad and zap the answer you chose. This might promote violence or negative behaviors, depending on how the student could react. Also, it is not a progressive game. It has one level and once you are finished, it is the end. If you choose to restart you will experience the same questions and answers. You are also not able to move on until you get all the answers correct, so if you are having trouble trying to figure out the correct letter, you could stay there for awhile.
In the online article Blended Learning: Making It Work In Your Classroom, teachers integrated digital learning with face-to-face lectures and observed impressive gains in student achievement. To introduce a game into my curriculum, I could start by lecturing about the topic. Then, with a selected group I could take them to play the educational game while I continue other activities. It could be used as down time, maybe. So the kids are still engaged in learning activities while I am not teaching.
Because I am doing special education, I am expected to teach general education content and this would be a fun way to incorporate English for ESL students or children with learning disabilities. It is a more interactive alternative to lecturing and students would enjoy it. However, I personally would not use this particular game. After assessing it, I realized that I need to look for games that are appropriate in all aspects. In this case, I would purposely get the wrong answers just to see what the outcome is. I learned later on after choosing the game that it was not a great game for young children because of that. At least now I am more aware of what I should be analyzing.
References:
- International Society for Technology in Education (http://www.iste.org/standards/standards-for-teachers)
- Blended Learning: Making it Work In Your Classroom. (2014, September 11). Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/practice/blended-learning-making-it-work-your-classroom
