Tried "Gamification" in my classroom.(Check updated post 283 for User Group info, it's now ready)

[Chiefwakka]

Tomorrow I'm going to try to get a usergroup put together and perhaps from here I can provide the hard numbers and raw data. My own edification and good grades (for my project) are only a part of motivation for doing this..if at least 1 person can use what I find to better a student's life, then hell every second was worth it.

Thank you. Because of you, I may survive until the end of the year. If it is adopted, I'll keep you posted on the results, if you'd like.

By all means, I'd love to hear it

 

[EGtodd09]

good on ya mate. Substitute teachers get almost no respect at my school, depending on how funny they look. I'm going to try and spread this around my school.

 

[Drake_Dercon]

Tomorrow I'm going to try to get a usergroup put together and perhaps from here I can provide the hard numbers and raw data. My own edification and good grades (for my project) are only a part of motivation for doing this..if at least 1 person can use what I find to better a student's life, then hell every second was worth it.

Thank you. Because of you, I may survive until the end of the year. If it is adopted, I'll keep you posted on the results, if you'd like.

By all means, I'd love to hear it

I will PM with any results that may come of this.

 

[Frotality]

usually id have reservations about increasing the disconnect kids have between education and the real reason we have it, but at this point im happy with anything that disrupts a kid's natural stagnation into ignorance and irresponsibility when they arent engaged, so i hope your plan works out, and would love to see a documentary about it if and when you can make one.

 

[Chiefwakka]

Thanks man, I've already got some rough ideas that I'm going to get tempered out like a Dwarf blacksmith on crack

And yeah, I think High School is going to be my preferred setting for this in the long run. Partly because I've built up a good bit of repoire with this school as a football coach and regular sub.

That's good, as you'll have to get the rights and permission to film in the school and permission from each parent to film the kids. It's quite the task.

Also, a side question: as a substitute, did you ever try Jigsaw teaching?

That's actually very hard to do as a sub. What I'm doing is encouraging behavior and learning outcomes, but it still has to be in the context of the teacher's lesson plan. It's actually considered very rude for a sub to change the plan up and do things their way, especially if the plans are very specific. Some teachers won't care and will tell you to be creative, but some have very specific ways of teaching and they prefer their subs to execute the plans in the same manner to ensure the students are fully engaged.

So, to answer your question, no I have not really had the opportunity to break the class up this way as a sub. I did do something like this when I was student teaching though. Grouping up kids based on ability level and let them teach each other can work well in some classes.

 

[Mr.logic]

Fantastic work man, your work makes me and many other gamers/human beings proud.

 

[Chiefwakka]

I can tell you now, this would not work in say, in an elementary grade level.

I'm curious as to why you think this is the case. With the proliferation of gaming into younger audiences and the accessability of things like iPhones, DS consoles etc. I see no reason that elementary education couldn't use similar impetus. Perhaps instead of things like lolly and chocolate rewards using a combination of levelling systems and achievement systems, similar but more explicitly organised than the cliche gold star method. It would need to be reshaped and the language around it changed, but I think it could still work.

Of course, I've never studied education, so I have a relatively layman perspective.

My mother's a university lecturer in chemistry and I've directed her towards the Extra Credits video, and to the guy who offered free consultation to educators. I think it could help her with workshops she's trialing in which the effort is to get students to interract with the material and each other. She has groups of three studens within a workshop set up so that one has done the senior highschool course, one has done a bridging course, and one has done neither. (To intergect a bit of nightmare fuel, 60% of her students have not done the highschool chemistry and only 30% of that 60 have done bridging) She's found that it takes a while for the students to engage with material and there are some who will still bludge off. I think in this situation, and in the situation of online assessments and discussions, gamification can be very helpful.

Edit: I just wanted to add that I'm thrilled you've posted this and I was very interested to read it. I look forward to any serial video, though you will have to be careful when it comes to getting filming permission within a classroom. Might even want to talk to The Escapist about a possible article or video lot too. I can't speak for the site but I think they'd be interested.

Maybe I was too blunt earlier, I think a better way to say would be that I doubt I could get it work at the elementary level...it's just not really a grade level I could teach very well. You're right though, I'm sure a good elementary teacher could make gamification work.

I'm going to go over to district office tomorrow and look into this, but the more I think about it I think I'm going to get shot down with classroom footage. I think the best I'll be able to do is video myself talking cause better to have me talk for 7 minutes than read 10 million pages of text that will crit you for 100,000 health and present my data/results.

 

[Chiefwakka]

The rush I've been feeling for the past several hours is giving way to sleep, since my hands won't stop I think my brain is intervening and shutting down. I will keep up to date with this thread, address new discussion points as they come along, and provide updates.

Again, much thanks to the escapist community thus far. You've given me a wealth of information to work with.

Have a good night everyone.

 

[Labyrinth]

I'm going to go over to district office tomorrow and look into this, but the more I think about it I think I'm going to get shot down with classroom footage. I think the best I'll be able to do is video myself talking cause better to have me talk for 7 minutes than read 10 million pages of text that will crit you for 100,000 health and present my data/results.

I think there's be potential if it's for research and development of teaching and learning resources. The key thing here is that you'll likely need good justification, permission from parents etc. It's entirely possible that you could get just that if you tried. Don't be disheartened until you do give it a shot because I think that it would make a great research topic.

Also, i'm not sure how education research is structured, but I see no reason that you couldn't provide a description of what you did, just as you have here as anecdotes backed up with data, images and perhaps student surveys.

 

[Pig Mazurka]

As a high school freshman myself, I wish you luck.

I look forward to seeing any results you may have.

 

[TilMorrow]

Its good to see someone trying a new concept in teaching but remember some things can only be effective for so long. Also be careful that you don't get the students dependant on the achievement system cause after a while they'll be wanting this system in other classes as well and some teachers aren't going to take well to the idea.

Well I'm off to form a business now that'll make an application for phones that can set up a network between students and teachers' phones and allows teachers to grant achievements to the students if they fulfil a specific requirement. It'll be called Schxl-lisson Achievements. Maybe.

 

[Logic 0]

If what you say is true then you may have found the secret to getting children to feign respect for a whole day.

 

[Singularly Datarific]

I see that the 'skinner box' can actually have real applications, without seeming evil, either!
The students clearly linked their actions to a consequence, a virtual prize, in this case, and they worked for it.
I gotta remember that.

 

[Saulkar]

Honesty, you sir are ahead of your time. I wish I was in your time.

 

[helldragonX]

Snip

You know, I wish that there were more teachers like you out there. There are to many teachers that just don't seem to care about wither their students actually learn something. If this can become a common practice it would be a great thing. Well can wait to see the documentary. Good Luck!

 

[EGtodd09]

Just sent an email to my school with a link to this thread and the copy-pasted original post. I hope it eventually gets to some of the substitute teachers, it could be really game-changing.

 

[Drexlor]

If only more teachers would try something like this.