Pupils with regular access to games based on traditional favourites such as space invaders and penalty shoot-outs significantly improved their scores in GCSE English, maths and science, it was revealed.
Teachers said the use of the system – employed by some 900 primary and secondary schools – promoted “stealth learning”, with children unwittingly picking up key skills while being engrossed in computer games.
via Computer games ‘improving pupils’ GCSE results’ – Telegraph.
In February, the education services company Pearson introduced Alleyoop, a personalized digital-tutoring service that tries to gamify the classroom — and to do it, specifically, outside of the classroom. Think Zynga, but smart. And also: Zynga, but trying to make you smart. The platform focuses on middle- and, in particular, high-school curricula, and emphasizes the immediate feedback aspects of the gamification model. Instead of a once-a-semester report card, featuring the blunt assessment metrics of letter grades, students get real-time feedback on the details of their performance — from real-time tutors who are not their teachers. The system is personalized, iterative, and adaptive, so a student having trouble with, say, trigonometry can delve into trigonometry at his or her own pace, learning from mistakes and gaining immediate rewards from successes.
The recent startup, Mindshapes, raised $4 million to build educational apps for children that work on mobile devices. Among its list of games are Magic Town, are Magic Town, a VR picture book to help children master reading skills, Language City, a VR game where students can practice using a new language by interacting with characters, and Meteor Math, an app to practice math skills.
