My ‘gamification’ project is in full swing and although I have struggled with some aspects of the overall aim of this project – I have to say that it has been very successful so far.

I am conducting an action research project around this class with the question “Does ‘gamification’ of a course enhance student engagement?”  In measuring this, I have data that I have obtained over the last few years teaching the course in a ‘traditional’ way.  The students have always been engaged in the course – making this a bit of a tough measure to get a handle on (you can read about the evolution of the course under my ‘XNA Project’ posts).

What I am struggling with at present is the whole idea of ‘a game.’  The problem with a game is that there are ‘winners’ and ‘losers’  In the classroom… is that really what we want?  I held an event last week in which I invited a couple of Microsoft techies to talk to some of the groups about Microsoft Kinect (pretty cool)!  However, I based this on which groups had submitted X,Y and Z.  It wasn’t like I could involve the whole class anyway – as their was a strict limit on the number.  But I found that some of the class didn’t really ‘compete’ – I don’t know if it was because they weren’t interested in the topic or if they kinda gave up as they felt the competition was too good.  Not sure – I will have to try to find this out – but it has given me cause to reflect on the concept as whole.  The class ‘feels’ a bit polarised.  I have about half that are really into it and engaged (much more so than normally) and about half that is possibly less engaged than normal (which probably averages out to about the same?)

Is it better to have a really high average or to have a number of students with really high results (but a lower overall average)?

I love the potential of gamification and the overall excitement that it is generating – but need to find a solution to this issue.  It is a work in progress!

So what is “Gamification”?  Here is the Wikipedia entry:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamification

Gamification is when you turn something into a game that is not a game to begin with.  It is something that interests me greatly for a number of reasons.  Firstly, there has been a lot of research done on the use of games in the classroom and the ways in which this effects student engagement (particularly with boys).  Secondly, it sounds like a lot of fun!

I currently teach a Year 10 elective called Game Design in which students write their own games for the XBOX360 (I have blogged about this class before – under the category ‘XNA Project’).  The students undertaking this class are quite engaged as it is – given that they are writing their own games and working with a development tool that lets them code for a games console.  In many ways, the course works extremely well as it is, but I am hoping that I can raise the level of engagement and improve the course to one that generates a real buzz of excitement.

Students spend the first part of the course learning how to program their own games and then form themselves into groups of 3 or 4 to make a game.  In forming their groups, I have promoted the idea that they are forming their own games companies and that these companies should have a good mix of personality types.  For example, they will need to have a good programmer (or two) on their team, but they will also need a graphic designer, someone in charge of writing / designing the plot and someone who will work on the user interface.  There can be an overlap in these roles – but they are all equally important.  The games industry contains these roles for sure – and many, many others – and one of my aims is to promote the fact that a job in the games industry need not be all about “cutting code”.

The question: “Does gamification lead to increased engagement?”

The idea: From the start of this semester, I will promote the idea of “the game”.  Students will start out with the concept that they are forming their own games companies, but need to earn some qualifications first.  As I am delivering the course content, instead of assessing this in a traditional way, I will merge the assessment into “the game” – which for the first part of the course will be centered on the skills they demonstrate.  The tasks that they complete will earn them “credits” towards particular qualifications (high quality work might be rewarded with higher qualifications in “the game”).

After the first stage of “the game” is complete, the games companies will be floated on the stock market and the students will begin game production.  Stock market reports, newspaper articles and reviews will be used to give feedback to students with the course culminating in a Games Industry Award presentation gala.

Assessment and feedback.  I would like to try to give feedback and carry out assessment within the boundaries of “the game”.  This may be tricky and I expect that some ways I do this will work and some will not – but that is all part of the process!

This year has seen a massive review of the curriculum at my school.  Over the course of the year, a large number of different proposals were discussed and we are beginning to get down to the specifics of implementation.  As this process has progressed, it has continued to be evident to me just how much times have changed and also the importance of catering what we offer to the learning styles of our students.  To illustrate this, I might use an almost trivial example. 

Recently, we spent quite a bit of time discussing the format of private study periods for our Year 12 students.  At present, each of our Year 12 students has a few private study periods, during which time they are expected to sit in our library and work (either collaboratively or individually).  A roll is taken during this time and non-attendance is treated very seriously.  However, the whole notion of a ‘private study’ period seems very 1980’s to me.  Do our students really benefit from such a formal gathering?  It would seem (from my own observations) that the students of today don’t generally like to work this way.  The students of today quite like flexible spaces, online gatherings, study when they feel like it and take their own downtime in the same spirit.  Is there a place in today’s schools for physical study spaces?  Is there benefit in having timetabled periods for students to study?  The answer to both questions is ‘yes’ but I think they we (as educators) need to be more flexible than this and offer more.

A big question for all educators today is: ‘how are we addressing the needs of the learning needs of this generation?’  It’s something that concerns me quite a lot.  Sure my teaching materials have evolved over the years and I have become a more experienced teacher, but what I am doing to engage those that sit my classroom each day?

We know a lot about the Generation Z students in our classrooms.  We know that they use technology in an immersive way and (as Mark Prensky puts it) “think at twitch speed”.  However, we also know that they are not the best critical thinkers and have a tendency to accept what they read.  Their brains have developed differently and some commentators like Nicholas Carr fear that the Internet is degrading the way that students study and think. 

We know that Generation Z are natural multi-taskers.  Even though they can do this with great skill (and to the admiration of Gen Xers like myself), it is also true that doing two things at once is not as good as concentrating on the completion of tasks in a sequential way.  Multi-tasking also provides many more opportunities for distraction.

There are many ways in which this generation of students can benefit from our experience.  Generally speaking we know how to perform tasks such as study for exams, critically review content on the Internet, construct an argument to support a proposal or address the criteria of an item of assessment.  However, if we choose to run our classrooms in the same ways as our own teachers did or in the way that suits our own learning style, we are not likely to succeed.

I don’t have all the answers.  There are techniques that I have used in the classroom that have worked and others that have not.  What I have found is that my students have responded to a very open and unstructured style.  Even though I keep them on track in terms of the curriculum, I do allow them to set the tone and we explore what interests them within this structure.  My students seem to enjoy the relaxed atmosphere of discussion type classes over lectures, so I try to move the focus from me to them as much as I can.  They also like to use the Internet and various apps while in class and I think this creates a dynamic and exciting environment (as long as I keep tabs on the distraction factor and keep them on task).  My students need frequent changes of pace – listening to me for an hour or two sends them to sleep, so I try to use lots of different media (as much as I can get my hands on).  In particular, as an IT educator, I feel that it is important to acknowledge that I don’t know everything.  I have students in my class that know more about aspects of IT than I do and even if they don’t, the Internet is always a “twitch” away to prove me wrong.  The trick is harnessing the strengths of those students in the class who can offer something – in ways that they feel comfortable contributing to.

My own journey with IT began in 1983.  As a Year 9 student, I narrowly missed out having the pleasure of using a large machine that was programmed with a card reader.  Instead we primarily used BBC Micro computers (not networked) as well as some Apple IIe’s.  During that year, my parents bought me my first home PC – a Commodore Vic 20 that had about 3500 bytes of RAM (bytes that is, not Kilobytes or Megabytes)!  The Vic 20 plugged into the TV and was able to load and save programs via a cassette recorder.  There were no hard drives around at that time – they were still a few years away, although the BBCs and Apple IIe’s at school had floppy drives which could store about 150 Kilobytes each. 

The thing about many of these early PCs was that you needed to load the operating system before you could start using them (which sounds perfectly sensible of course).  However, with a single floppy drive, this amounted to booting the PC up with the operating system floppy in the drive and taking it out once it had loaded.  The programs that you wanted to run could then be put into the drive, but any calls to the operating system meant that you would need to swap the operating system back in again.  Many users bought two floppy drives just so they could keep the operating system floppy in one drive all the time to prevent this.

After a year or two, my parents bought me a BBC Micro.  I now had 32KB of RAM at my disposal!  I used to buy many of the IT magazines that were published at the time that featured programs you could type in yourself and play with.  I would eagerly type in the hundreds of lines of code and then set about debugging and getting them to work.  Soon I was writing my own game programs and sharing them with my friends.  I remember writing a program for the 1985 Science Talent Search in which you could place an object in front of any combination of mirrors or lenses and it would show you the location of the image.

I have fond memories of my time at High School as I learnt the fundamentals of software development.  Programming in those days was not only focused on solving particular problems, but was also highly influenced by the limited resources that were available.  It was common to write programs that would not be able to be executed as they would use up all of the available RAM.  Methods such as recursion were commonplace – we even experimented with code that would rewrite itself in order to save space.  Limited networking was implemented in our school in 1984 and I have vivid memories of writing a program designed to mimic the operating system in order to gain access to the administrator password.  Perhaps I invented phishing without even knowing it?

I took Year 12 Computer Science in 1986 and it was an absolute joy.  Coding was my strength (and my passion).  Overall it was my best subject and I went on to Monash Uni the next year to further my studies.  The languages became harder.  I had used Basic predominately, but now moved on to Fortran, Cobol, Lisp, Logo and C+.  C+ was certainly the most powerful of these, but even by 1989, when I finished my degree, we were some way from the style of object orientated programming that we it commonplace today.  My major project converted 2D architectural drawings (in coordinate form) to 3D isometric representations, with hidden line removal and full perspective.  You could even change the position of the ‘camera‘ within the program – although not in real time.  It was written in C+ and took a good 8 months of work.

Teaching was always what I wanted to do, but my love of computing meant that a career of teaching IT was the natural course to take.  After completing my Diploma in Education, I began teaching.  Keyboarding was a popular inclusion in the IT curriculum at most schools in those days, and so I found myself teaching Year 7 and Year 8 keyboarding class.  Not able to touch type myself (being a classic two finger typist), I miraculously managed to get through the year without once having to press a single key. 

In 1993, I went out on a limb and purchased an Internet connection for the school.  It was accessed via a 14.4 modem (via the phone line) and when it connected, we loaded up a copy of Netscape Navigator that had been sent by our ISP and we eagerly waiting to see what would happen next.  A group of excited students were huddled behind me as I typed in the first URL I had ever typed into a browser.  I can’t remember what URL that was, but I suspect that we had narrowed in on the NASA website or something similar.  A chunk of uninspiring text, interspersed with blue hyperlinks cascaded (although slowly) down the screen and every so often, an image would slowly be unveiled.  A new era had begun, and my students would lobby me for time to browse the web, use email or read through the thousands of newsgroups that seemed to be on offer.

In recent times, although the advancement of technology seems to have slowed a little, I have reflected on my own personal journey.  One of the main catalysts for this reflection may has been that I turned 40 last year.  Most of the students that I am teaching now have never not known the Internet.  They have never not been connected.  I used to wonder how life was for my parents, growing up in the time of radio and the introduction of television.  Just as I took television for granted growing up, students today take connectedness as a given.  In what ways will the world evolve by the time my current students turn 40?  What technologies will they look back on fondly?

Our school is currently in the process of working through a curriculum review process and this has given all of the staff here pause to reflect on what we are doing in the classroom.  Amongst the resources that our Principal presented to us were the findings of a study conducted by John Hattie of the University of Auckland.  Here is a link to his study: https://www.det.nsw.edu.au/proflearn/docs/pdf/qt_hattie.pdf

The findings of John Hattie’s study have resonated with me and in many respects, given me quite a shock.  Now certainly one study is just that – one study.  But in the case of Hattie’s work, he conducted a meta-study of over 500 separate studies encompassing more than 200 million students in total!  Included in his meta-analysis, were many studies concerning positive (or otherwise) effects on student outcomes.  For example, Hattie included research that had been done into the use of open learning spaces in education, the effect of different sorts of technology on the classroom, different pedagogies and teacher effectiveness.  In compiling his data, Hattie created a scale of effectiveness that ranked all of these effects into those items that had a profound effect, those that had no discernable effect and those that had a negative effect.

Now before I tell you about the key results of Hattie’s study (or at the least the parts that hit home), I should firstly set the scene.  Hattie examined the places and factors influencing a student’s learning.  The student’s themselves have the largest part to play.  Also playing a role are the student’s parents, the school, their home life as well as their peers.  The important thing to note is that we as teachers can influence very few of these.  Teachers are the second biggest influence of student outcomes (bigger than home, peers, school put together) – and we also have the most control of this aspect of a student’s educational experience (being their teachers). 

There were clearly defined circumstances or actions that had a negative effect on student learning.  They included retention, changing schools and large class sizes.  There is probably nothing in that list that will shock you. 

The middle ground of actions is where some interesting statements have been made.  Basically, Hattie proposes that the methods within the middle ground have a positive effect, but the effect that they have is comparable to other (or standard) methods and therefore, may as well not be implemented.  For example, the use of technologies such as Interactive Whiteboards – great in the classroom right?  Well they do have a positive effect on learning – and Hattie does not argue that technologies like this do not.  However, their effect is basically comparable to other traditional teaching methods.  That is, we should not imagine that simply placing technologies like this in the class-room will instantly transport our students to a higher plane of understanding.  There is no technological Holy Grail!

So what does have a profound effect on our students?  It’s very simple – and it is something that I have written about before – it’s all about engagement!  Passionate teachers, who know their subject and are excited by it, encourage their students to engage in deeper learning and understanding of their discipline.  Their knowledge and the way in which they are able to contextualize the learning, enable their students to take the same journey.

Also high on Hattie’s list is classroom control.  One of the main influences on student outcomes is a well managed classroom.  Simple as that.

So what does this mean for us ‘IT types’?  Does it mean that all the tech we are using, the 1-1 computing, the collaborative environments, the web2.0 gizmos, the multimedia rich teaching environments we create – are all for nothing?  Not at all, but it does mean that these things without the passion of a creative, knowledgeable, inspirational teacher, don’t add much to the educational value of our classrooms.

I am a big fan of conferences.  In my time I have been to both good ones and bad ones.  I won’t mention any names – although I will say that the VITTA conference for me has always been one of the best.  So what is it that makes a successful conference and sets it apart from one that is the opposite?  Being involved with the organization of the VITTA conference has given me a different perspective on this, but the general rules still apply – and for me it is all about the delegates.

I recently had the pleasure of attending the ULearn09 Conference in Christchurch, NZ.  I presented some sessions and attended many others – and had a really great experience.  During my time at the Conference I reflected on some of the things that set a successful conference aside from an unsuccessful one – and some of the things that you can do as a delegate to get the most out of an event.  So in the spirit of this reflection, here is my list of things you can do at a conference that will enrich your experience (possibly)!

1. Present a Conference session

 Present a session.  Even if you do it with someone else or break the time slot down and share it – just do it!  Often I find that the best networking occurs in the sessions that I present.  This happens because those that are attending my sessions already have an interest in the topics I am discussing.  I also find that I can get challenged in my sessions by those that have some experience but have questions or some doubts about what I am saying.  It doesn’t matter at all – presenting is definitely not a one way communication and I find I always leave a presentation with lots of ideas to put into practice.

2. Network with people you have never met

Networking is easy with people you know.  It probably isn’t really networking actually!  Find someone you have never met before and make a connection.  There may be no connection to be made – but have a go and see!  It can be easy to chat to those you are seated near in the Keynote or a session and even easier at a time in the day when delegates are taking a break.  Just introduce yourself and have a go – there is nothing to lose and it is great fun.

3. Check out the trade show

Definitely check out the trade show – but further to this, walk up to an exhibitor that is selling a product that you have never seen and ask them about it.  You may be pleasantly surprised.

4. Attend a session that you know nothing about

When you are looking through the conference program prior to the event, pick out those sessions that are of interest but also have a good look at those that are complete unknowns to you.  You may be tempted to rule these sessions out altogether – but how do you know that they are not of value to you if you know nothing about them?  It is a risk – and sometimes you will come away have learnt nothing at all.  However, you could also discover something new and incredible!

Recently, my main hard drive suffered a serious break-down.  Are there break-downs that are not serious I hear you ask?  Well, this was the kind of break-down that forced me to redefine my ‘levels’ of serious.  The kind that presents you with a horrible sinking feeling as you stare at the blinking DOS prompt when you attempt to reboot the drive.  The kind that produces some incredible (but ultimately quite sickening) noises when you attempt to plug the drive in as a second drive on another PC.  The kind in which all data is destroyed in the blink of an eye.

Each year I lecture my students on the merits of maintaining a disciplined backup regime.  After all, data is so volatile.  I have heard it said that there are only two sorts of hard drive – those that have failed and those that will fail.  I tell this to my students as well as other anecdotes such as ‘only backup that data which you cannot afford to lose’.  However, each year there are students of mine that lose data.  They lose data on thumb drives (which are notorious), portable hard drives, CDs and DVDs.  Yet the message does not seem to be getting through.  Is this something that IT students need to learn first-hand?

The amount of data that we are personally producing each day is incredible.  We are producing more data than ever before – and some of it is quite large, such as video and high quality images.  With the advent of digital photography, we now take many, many photos whereas a decade ago, we would have bought a couple of canisters of film and used them up.  Even then, there would have been shots that did not come out.  Now, we generally ditch bad shots after taking them and proceed to take multiple copies of others – just in case.  Have we become sloppy photographers in the process – becoming content with quantity over quality?  Possibly – but this is a discussion for another time. 

The collection of my own personal data is now invaluable to me.  I have a large collection of photos and media that are not available in any other format.  All of my tax records, personal correspondence, financials, etc. are all electronic and basically irreplaceable.  Given that this is the case, how much backup is too much or not enough?  Should we be backing our data up on a daily basis?  Should we be running RAID arrays or taking data off-site?  The answer is probably a big yes to all of these.  So why don’t I do all of these? 

I don’t take many chances with my data, but my recent crash took me completely off guard.  There was data that I lost which I had not backed up for a while and it hurt.  Is this simply a trial that we (as IT Professionals) must go through for the greater good?  There is no doubt that my recent predicament has made for some nice anecdotes in class – but has it made a difference to my students?  Probably not.  It could simply be that until we are the victims of such a data loss, we don’t think about how bad such a loss can be.  In cases where hard drives had stopped working for me in the past, I had found ways to retrieve the data – so perhaps I felt a bit too confident in this area.  Perhaps my ex-hard drive was able to sense this complacency and decided to put me in my place?  Perhaps I am thinking about this way too much!

So I am now far wiser in the area of backing up my data than I was a few weeks ago, and in this sense – the process has at least had some positives!

The end of the semester has come around and my students have submitted their work and moved to their next electives.  I now have a new group of students – which I am quite excited about as I will be able to build on what I have done so far.  It seems like the perfect time for a reflection on the semester, so here goes!

I have been teaching programming for 18 years and have been using games in the classroom for about 10 years.  However, this is the first year I have implemented a course like this.  For me, it’s all about engagement – and this course has hit the mark!  I wanted to give them an experience as close to one that they would have working as a games developer (in a classroom and in 6 months)! 

Students took a while to come to grips with C# (and XNA) but they did – with lots of help and examples.  I had to write a lot of material, and in many cases was doing this a lesson or two in advance of the class (as you sometimes have to do as an IT teacher)!  Students were very excited about programming for the XBOX360 and this has also helped drive them through ‘the tough times’.  Having said that, by limiting the course to 2D arcade type games and giving the students lots of examples, it wasn’t as difficult as I imagined it might be.

Teaching C# has definite benefits.  It is a close cousin to C++ which my students will come into contact with later on if they select an IT course.  It has also continued the development of my students for VCE Software Development 3/4 – where the ability to manipulate and write code is required.

I had the students form mini ’game-companies’ of 3 or 4 students.  Within these groups, there have generally been students who have designed all of the sprites / graphics, students who have done the menus and the infrastructure coding and those that have had the skills (and interest) in coding the game mechanics.  I think I can formalise this structure better by informing students about what types of skills are best to have in each group.  I asked the groups to create their own logo, which each group then included on the splash screen of their game.

I am going to upload some screen captures from the completed projects – so these will give you an idea of what they have done.   

This is an example of a program that has been written by a group of students adapting the tutorials that I gave them at the start of the semester, which in turn were based on the 2D tutorials on the XNA Creators Club site.

The cannon that was fixed in the bottom left hand corner of the screen can be moved freely around.  In addition, although it is hard to see on the image above, the enemy UFOs drop bombs.  The explosion effect is pretty impressive and utilizes some nifty particle code.

Another group of students has created a great Space Invaders clone.  The enemy space ships do speed up quite a lot towards the end and the frequency of their bombs increases – which makes it quite challenging!

In each of the blog posts that I write, I like to share my thoughts on topics that are current or making an impact on my teaching / life as an IT professional.  Sometimes I have a bit of a rant and other times, what I say is very considered.  However, in the past few weeks I have had meetings with more than 1 person that has told me that they read something interesting on my blog.  In some cases these have been people that I have not met before.  There is a saying that most of a first impression is made in the first thirty seconds of meeting someone.  Perhaps in this new digital age, we should amend this saying somewhat?

Everyone has a digital identity.  Like it or not, it is out there and people do get an impression of you (both personally and professionally) via the www.  The media is full of examples of employees who have been laid off after aspects of their social life have intruded into the workplace via the web.  For each one of these examples, imagine the number of times when employees have been passed up for promotion, applications for positions have been turned down or private lives have been exposed negatively and the story has not made the news.  References and referees on job applications are worth so little these days – as most employers will Google their job applicants to gain a real impression of who they are.  I have heard of cases where applications have not been shortlisted based on inappropriate images on FaceBook or MySpace pages.  Sometimes these decisions are simply based on the friends that someone lists on their page.  A person’s photo and bio may be quite acceptable, but add a couple of photos from linked friends with images of them drinking or appearing irresponsible, and it becomes a situation of ‘guilt by association’.

Digital identity is something our students both understand and fail to comprehend at the same time.  Discuss digital identity with your students and you will discover that it is something that comes with the territory of growing up.  It is infused with who they are and who they would like to be.  They create their own spaces, communities, links and web presence and yet they do not comprehend the ways in which what they say and do could affect them now and in the future.  My current Year 12 students were born around 1993.  They are the oldest students in the school and yet they have never not known the Internet.  They have grown up with connectedness and yet they lack a good understanding of the dangers of the Internet and the importance of digital identity.  This is an area where we need to do more.  We do much to spread the message about cyber-safety and cyber-bullying – now is the time to bring digital identity to the fore.

It is said that you never get a second chance to make a first impression.  Should we also be saying ‘you never get a second chance to make a first digital impression’?  If a first impression is made within the first thirty seconds, is a first digital impression made in the first 30 Google results? 

If you don’t make a habit of ‘Googling’ yourself, perhaps you should.  The ways in which my identity manifests itself on the www never cease to surprise me.  Sure, my web page features and booksellers that are distributing my books for example.  VITTA obviously features prominently, but what often surprises me is the links that will appear to mailing list posts that have been archived on web-sites or when others have mentioned my name within their own posts.  A comment that I placed into a feedback form on a web-site appears – totally unrelated to my professional life.  Depending on how you have various profiles configured, you may also get hits from Ebay, Yahoo groups or other online communities that you belong to.  Move over to Google images and you may be able to find a photo of yourself. 

The topic of digital identity is one for now.  Talk about it with your students whenever you have the chance.  There will always be stories from the media to spark the conversation and students will no doubt be able to relate their own perceptions and experiences.  You can always Google yourself in class as a demonstration – but (like all good teachers), you will already know the answer to the question!