Game Design as an Interactive Learning Environment for Fostering Students' and Teachers' Mathematical Inquiry |
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Authors: | YB Kafai ML Franke CC Ching and JC Shih |
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Institution: | (1) UCLA, Graduate School of Education & Information Studies, 405 Hilgard Ave, Mailbox 951521, Los Angeles, CA, 90095-1521, U.S.A |
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Abstract: | Many learning environments, computer-based or not, have been developed for either students or teachers alone to engage them
in mathematical inquiry. While some headway has been made in both directions, few efforts have concentrated on creating learning
environments that bring both teachers and students together in their teaching and learning. In the following paper, we propose
game design as such a learning environment for students and teachers to build on and challenge their existing understandings
of mathematics, engage in relevant and meaningful learning contexts, and develop connections among their mathematical ideas
and their real world contexts. To examine the potential of this approach, we conducted and analyzed two studies: Study I focused
on a team of four elementary school students designing games to teach fractions to younger students, Study II focused on teams
of pre-service teachers engaged in the same task. We analyzed the various games designed by the different teams to understand
how teachers and students conceptualize the task of creating virtual game learning environment for others, in which ways they
integrate their understanding of fractions and develop notions about students' thinking in fractions, and how conceptual design
tools can provide a common platform to develop meaningful fraction contexts. In our analysis, we found that most teachers
and students, when left to their own devices, create instructional games to teach fractions that incorporate little of their
knowledge. We found that when we provided teachers and students with conceptual design tools such as game screens and design
directives that facilitated an integration of content and game context, the games as well as teachers' and students' thinking
increased in their sophistication. In the discussion, we elaborate on how the design activities helped to integrate rarely
used informal knowledge of students and teachers, how the conceptual design tools improved the instructional design process,
and how students and teachers benefit in their mathematical inquiry from each others' perspectives. In the outlook, we discuss
features for computational design learning environments.
This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date. |
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