Gardens of Time

I really like how this game is a game in a game of sorts. While you are accomplishing missions, you are earning money and reputation to unlock and buy items for your property. A game like this is good for your memory and to try and keep your thoughts moving fast. I try to remember where things are so that the next time I go back to a board I can find them quickly and make better time. I do tend to get a little stressed always trying to speed up my time from my previous visit. I think I will get better as I continue to play the game.

DEJ #1 for Game Design and Learning

"What makes video games good for learning has little or nothing to do directly
with the fact that they are games."

I can see where the author is coming from in this quote. It may not really have anything to do with the fact that they are games, but that it is a way for the students to learn to work more independently, it is another method of teaching, and many times it is considered a treat or prize. Kids do not come to school and sit in front of a television or computer all day, if that were the case then trying to "teach" through video games would not be a real treat or would be routine. The treat in that case would be if the teacher were to actually teach.

"So the video games in which I am interested, the ones that I think are most
interesting for learning, are digital simulations of worlds that are “played” in the sense
that a player has a surrogate or surrogates through which the player can act within and on
the simulation and that have “win states” (reachable goals that the player has discovered
or formed through his or her surrogate)."

I had to use that quote because once upon a time when I didn't have a child, school, work, house, and all of the other things that life has to offer, I loved to play The Sims. It was nice to be able to make the avatar be whoever you wanted, build the house that you wanted, and have the relationships that you wanted. It was a fun way to pretend and have some control over things. I liked the goals of the game and trying to make my little avatar succeed and meet those goals. I think a game based on the same situation would maybe interest some kids if there were some type of learning basis in the game as well.

"The view of the mind I have sketched argues, as far as I am concerned, that the
mind works rather like a video game. For humans, effective thinking is more like
running a simulation in our heads within which we have a surrogate actor than it is about
forming abstract generalizations cut off from experiential realities."

He seemed to hit the nail on the head. I never would have thought of our mind as a video game but after reading this I could see how how this is true. I often try to think of outcomes for every possible scenario if I am trying to make a big decision. I think that it is something that many of us do.

Reference:
Gee, J. P., & Morgridge, T. (n.d.). Why Are Video Games Good For Learning?. In http://www.academiccolab.org. Retrieved January 27, 2012, from http://www.academiccolab.org/resources/documents/MacArthur.pdf


Link:

http://www.wv.gov/education/Pages/classroomsimulationgames.aspx

This is a simulation game that we used for one of our classes at Fairmont State. It is a teacher simulation game and gives you a classroom of students along with a variety of different scenarios. Your job is to keep your students learning in a safe, healthy environment. I thought it was fun, but you have to be on your "A" game just like in a real classroom.

Week One- Introduction Post- Educ 6814

Step 3. An introductory post that tells us:

a.Where you are from and what do you do.
Hello. My name is Jessica and I am currently a substitute teacher in Harrison and Taylor County. I also work the night shift in the processing department at Huntington Bank.
I hope that this class will teach me inventive and fun ways to integrate games into my classroom. I do like playing games when I get a chance. I used to be hooked on facebook games like Farm Ville, but then I got easily bored and frustrated with the way the games started running. Right now I am into playing Words with Friends on my phone. It's a scrabble type game and very addicting. I think games are a fun way to relax and have down time. I think that video games are fine for kids, but that they shouldn't consume the child's life. There should be time limits placed on the amount of time that they are played. We have an Xbox 360 Kinect which my daughter and I frequently play, we play a game with baby tigers where you control the cat and and Dance Central. They are fun and it keeps up moving in the winter time when it is too cold to be outside.

Children and Video Games The link that I chose discussed some of the effects that video games could have on children. It discussed the benefits of games that were educational for children, but also the negative effects games with violence could have on children. I chose this link because as parents we are the ones buying the games and we need to select and monitor games for our children that will help them in a positive way and not produce negative actions.

I was born in 1981. Three major world events that happened during that year were: Prince Charles and Princess Diana were married, MTV was introduced, and the space shuttle Columbia was launched.

PSA

My Public Service Announcement

Annotated Bibliography

Annotated Bibliography

Abilock, D. (2003). A seven power lens on 21st century literacy. http: / /www. noodletool s. com/debbi e / l i t e r a c i e s / newsmedi a /polphoto.pdf

There are seven different lenses or tools that are used to critique media literacy. It is important for students to be able to use the lenses to analyze and apply their skills in media literacy. Students should look at the whole picture to assist them in analyzing. Examining nonverbal gestures, facial expressions, and who is in the picture are just some of the tools that can help to tell a lot about a picture.

Hobbs, R. (1996). Teaching media literacy: Yo! are you hip to this?. Retrieved from http://www.medialit.org/reading-room/teaching-media-literacy-yo-are-you-hip

This article was on the Center for Media Literacy webpage and talks about a teacher who incorporated media literacy into her classroom. She is showing different commercials and asking students questions about the commercials based on target audiences, what is being sold, and how they interpret the commercials. The article goes on to discuss how many other educators are integrating media literacy into their curriculum and see it as a useful tool that will help beuild relevance and link the classroom to the world.

Kellner, D., & Share, J. (2005). Toward critical media literacy: core concepts, debates, organizations, and policy. Discourse: studies in the cultural politics of education, 26(3), 369-386.

This article discusses models of media literacy, core concepts, and national media organizations in the United States. Media literacy is used to help people evaluate and examine different forms of media, from the standard print form (books, newspapers, and magazines) or technological media (television, movies, and Internet). The Center for Media Literacy identified five core concepts that are easily accessible to teachers and students. The concepts are: Core Concept 1. Principle of Non-Transparency: All media messages are ‘‘constructed’’; Core Concept 2. Codes and Conventions: Media messages are constructed using a creative language with its own rules: Core Concept 3. Audience Decoding: Different people experience the same media message differently; Core Concept 4. Content and Message: Media have embedded values and points of view; Core Concept 5. Motivation: Media are organized to gain profit and/or power. There are many small literacy organizations in the United States, but there are two major ones. The Alliance for a Media Literate America attempts to unite media literacy organizations, while the Action Coalition for Media Education is against any type of corporate media.

nb5619. (2010, October 25). Learn critical thinking through media literacy education.Retrieved from http://medialiteracycolloquium.wordpress.com/2010/10/25/learn-critical-thinking-through-media-literacy-education/

This article discussed Pennsylvania’s teachers adjusting their curriculum to incorporate standardized test preparation into their lessons. Students in grades from eight to eleven had to score well in the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment standardized tests in order to see if they have made their “adequate yearly progress”. One of the teachers decided to improve on her students’ learning by teaching critical thinking skills by studying media literacy.

DEJ 13

Question 1: Should media education have an explicit political and ideological agenda?

I do not think that media education should have an explicit political and ideologiical agenda. The article discussed that often times when media educators come together to collaborate that it leads to tension among the group. It seems that media education should be based on diversity and for those studying media literacy to develop their own ideas first and not be "spoiled" by others agendas.

Question 2: Based on your reading to date in this course, would you teach critical media literacy in the classroom? Why or why not? You must reference three prior course readings to justify your answer to this questions.

Yes, I would teach critical media literacy in my own classroom. I think that there are so many media skills that would be a great advantage in student learning. Students should be able to critique and analyze things that they read or watch in the media. "By sequentially focusing seven increasingly strong lenses on the news media, beginning with a close-up look at news photo, students learn to apply powerful cross-disciplinary skills of visual, news media, and information literacy to analyze current political issues." This was from the article, Seven Power Lens on 21st Century Literacy.

I would also use the article ,Learn Critical Thinking through Media Literacy to justify students needing to be able to think critically. "It is beneficial to all participating: students develop critical thinking skills and learn about media literacy; students use their critical thinking skills to score higher on standardized tests." Sometimes I feel that students are so used to having the answers handed to them that when it comes time to think critically or on there own they do not know how. I feel that teaching media literacy would help students in every grade.

The last reference source that I would use to justify my answer is, Measuring the Acquisition of Media Literacy Skills. In this article, researchers conducted a study to answer one central question , "How does media-literacy instruction, integrated within a yearlong course in high school English languagearts, affect the development of students’ message comprehension, writing, and critical-thinking skills? Their result were data that emerged from the study suggested the improvement that media literacy instruction had on the students' ability to identify main ideas in written, audio, and visual media. So, I feel that it is something that has been researched and is ready to be taught in the classroom.


References:
Atlock, D. "Seven Power Lens on 21st Century Literacy ." Multimedia Schools. (2003): n. page. Web. 18 Nov. 2011. http://www.noodletools.com/debbie/literacies/newsmedia/PowerLensSingle.pdf.

Hobbs, R. (1998). The seven great debates in the media literacy movement. Journal of Communication. 48 (1) p.16

Learn critical thinking through media literacy education. (2010, October 25). Retrieved from http://medialiteracycolloquium.wordpress.com/2010/10/25/learn-critical-thinking-through-media-literacy-education/

Week 12. Video.

I finally got my video up and running. I had to publish it first. I wish I could have used the photostory software because I wanted to narrarate the story with music in the background, but I could not get photostory to work on my computer. I used Windows Movie Maker for my project.