Fall 2014 Edition
By Jason Frank
Instructional Designer
“Fun from games arises out of
mastery. It arises out of
comprehension. It is the act of solving
puzzles that makes games fun. In
other words, with games, learning is
the drug.” Raph Koster
Walking the line between an engaging
game and one that “teaches” is not
easy. A compelling game induces, what
Csikszentmihaly refers to as the ‘flow
state,’ which causes the player to focus
completely on the task at hand and
zone out of everything else going on
around them. This makes it difficult to
How do we balance fun and
internalize the lessons one is supposed
engagement with the necessary
to gain. However, if a game is too
academic rigor that students need to
focused on the teaching of a concept or
be successful? GAMES!
skill, then it often ceases to be fun. The
Games can teach us a lot. We can learn educational value of a game comes in
to solve problems, we can learn to work the discussions that take place before
and after play. Below are ways use that
in teams to accomplish goals, we can
gain valuable lessons on probability (as Gamification promotes higher learning.
anyone who’s ever spent a weekend in
Games as engagement tool. Student
Vegas can attest) and, of course, we
engagement is something that all
can always improve our hand-eye
teachers think about. Games can be
coordination.
one way to capture student attention