Highlights

Life Long Learning

Highlights from the Book

Excerpts from the book,

"Life Long Learning - Transforming Learning; Discovering
Learning Through Living Life in Unlimitless Possibilities"

are reflected within the pages of the Life Long Learning book...

Life Long Learning - Transforming Learning; Discovering Learning

Through Living Life In Unlimitless Possibilities -

The following is an excerpt taken from the chapter entitled “Let’s Play Some Games ~ Video Games”

Ah, the ever twisting and turning inner turmoil of to video and computer games or not to video and computer games. From my own unique perspective, having our boys play video games is actually beneficial in so many ways. There are many logical reasons for and such learning that comes from giving children the gift of having access to video games without placing restrictions upon the quantity of playtime or the type of games played.

Video games provide a huge opportunity for learning. I think that it helps to view video games as high quality multimedia demonstrations and interactive, challenging exercises in complex multidisciplinary subject matter. In general, an individual, whether it be a child or an adult, will want to keep playing a video game until they have learned and experienced as much as it is possible for them to learn and experience. Then they stop. It is a bit like reading a novel really. If it is a real page-turner, you do not want to stop in the middle when things are getting exciting, and sometimes you want to read it again right away to understand some of the parts of the book from a new perspective. It is the same thing with video games.

Video games are math as well. That is not just a platitude. Video games really are math. Video game strategy and 3D mapping is much higher math than compulsory education can even think of having children learn. Also, through the creation and exploration of various new worlds, children are able to see beyond the box that we as a society tend to place them in, and are able to be out of the box thinkers, thereby, creating unlimitless possibilities for themselves, their lives, and the lives of those around them.

We as humans think and learn best when we attempt to reason via logic and general abstract concepts within perceiving patterns through actual experiences in the world. Video games give to us those patterns within the gaming experience. Video games provide language and symbolic terminology that is a means of learning a whole new language. Video and computer gaming is a language that is viewed by many in our society as wrong and not allowed immersion in, merely because it is in the form of a game. If you were to learn Japanese, you would you not immerse yourself into the language by attempting to read, write, and speak that language? It is the same with video gaming.

Reading and Math in Video Gaming

Let us explore more in-depth that of learning to read and actually reading within video and computer gaming. In compulsory education, children must learn to read and are given reading tests for comprehension that ask and require general factual, dictionary, and specific cut and dry answers, with no regard to the many facets that the question or questions may have. In many cases as well, children are expected to read and understand words, phases, and sentences that in fact they may not even know of or understand the meaning to, yet they are “required” to know them, simply because the “standards” say they must.

Take for example, that of James Paul Gee’s (a book I highly recommend reading, as it is pack full of information, much more than I could ever write here about how much we all truly to learn from video gaming) example within his book, What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy, when he states the sentence about basketball ~ “The guard dribbled down the court, held up two fingers, and passed to the open man”. James Paul Gee goes on to state that “A typical reading test would ask a question like this: “What did the guard do to the ball? And give “bounce it” as one of the choices. Unfortunately, you can answer such general, factual, dictionary like questions and really have no idea what the sentence means in the domain of basketball. When we see that the same thing applies to sentences from science or any other schooling type subjects, we immediately see why so many children pass early reading tests but cannot learn later on in other areas of learning subjects”.

The same such thing can be said about mathematical equations. There are hundreds if not possibly thousands of varieties of ways to conduct the same mathematical equation and yet still come to the same end result answer. In the schooling environment, we begin in the first few years to show this to children, by showing that there are many ways to make the number four, such as that of 2+2, and 3+1 and 5-1 and so on. Yet, somewhere along the way, about the age of nine or ten teachers, administrators, parents, and society as a whole, place a demand upon children to learn a certain way, and are punished if they create another way to solve a mathematical equation that is not the same as the teachers way. I watched this happen time and time again with Chris as he went through 5^th and 6^th grade. He had one teacher who would literally not count for credit his math schooling work if it was not done exactly the way the teacher had taught it, even when the answers were clearly correct.

By James Paul Gee’s example, we can see how children within a schooling environment are placed inside of a box, are “taught”, and are only able to view reading and other aspects of learning from one view, rather than being able to step outside of the box and view life and learning from as many sides as possibility allows. Consequently, children today are not learning and are not learning how to think, let alone think out of the box within the schooling environment. They are learning simply how to memorize and recite information as if they are a robot. In the example that James Paul Gee sites, within the context of that one simple sentence, those words can be interpreted in a plethora of ways. We can see that the word dribble for instance, can mean to drool, thereby having a completely diverse meaning from that of a basketball context.

Therefore, if we do not take the time to learn with our children to step out of the box and to view all possibilities of meaning and to see which ones fit within the context of what the author of the words intends and then yet again view it another way still, then our children are missing out on the unlimitless possibilities that life and learning have to offer. They miss the opportunities to take the written word and to translate into something that has meaning and connection to them and to their world.

Video and computer gaming provide this ability to step out of the box. Within any one game, there are literally thousands of ways to read and explore reading in a multitude of contexts, to distinguish and re-distinguish language. There is learning in strategic problem solving, leadership, and that of the journey to achieving total mastery of something. It is that journey to mastery, as well as these other skills and more, that our children can take and utilize their whole life long for learning. And they can do so successfully, much more successfully than that of us or of others before us.

Video and computer gaming also can give us a jumping off point for learning beyond that game. For making connections and experimenting with options for learning within the game and beyond the game. For instance, our boys love the game of Tetris. Since Tetris is about mathematically stacking sets of blocks together in order to make them fit together into a puzzle dimension to clear levels and of that of patterning, sorting and more, we took this learning and transcended it into that of doing the same thing with Legos. Legos, then turned into a trip to Legoland here in town, where we explored in great detail that of Legoland Miniland USA, and also saw an exhibit on how they actually make Legos. This turned into history about where Legos came from, which is from Denmark. This turned into an ancestral learning, as my grandmother, the boy’s great grandmother, was born, and raised in Copenhagen until the age of two. All of these connections of possibility and more came out of one small video game called Tetris. What wonder, what awe, and what learning, and even what fun while we were learning all came from one small video game called Tetris.

Matthew and Anthony have also learned so much about how a video game is actually made as well. Matthew took a video game design class in which he learned how to using computer software, design from conception to actually play his own video game. Many mathematical equations and connotations are devised when creating a video game, things of which I cannot even begin to explain, let alone write here within the pages of this book. In the scope of mathematics as a whole, I can honestly say that our children know more high-level math, not only than most children their age, but they know more mathematic skills than that of many adults, including myself and my family!

Matthew has designed several games since that time and has passed on his video game design wisdom to his younger brother Anthony. So not only do our boys have learning from a game playing standpoint, but they also know the “behind the scenes” view, if you will, on what it takes and how much actually goes into the process, frame by frame, of making a video game. Not too many people get this unique perspective, as we usually just view and play with the finished product. Our children have a newfound appreciation for all of the designers and the thousands of hours it takes to produce a game that we can make play and work within mere minutes.

There are a multitude of mathematic equations that can be solved in a myriad of ways in any one video or computer game. And it is not just what society deems as “educational” games that we have out on the market today either. I have observed the mathematical learning of fractions in a game called as Mario Sunshine, which is by industry standards not considered an “educational game”, yet there is much learning within the dimensions of this game and all of the thousands upon thousand of gaming options available today.

I often sit and laugh when hearing the words spoken by others when they call something educational, or that a game or toy is educational. I laugh because the notion that only certain select things are considered “educational” to me sound to be rather absurd. Everything in life has something of value to learn from, from the speck of dirt on someone shoe all the way through to the concept of what planets exist in our universe, and everything in between. We can learn from anything and everything that life and all that is in life, has to offer us. So to say that only certain things are educational and others are not, seems rather silly to me.

For the Love of the Game

I tend to view our children's video gaming as their work or their passion ~ work that they are immersed in and love. And there is such a love for it that it does not feel like work to them at all. Kind of like in life for us as adults, when we find our life’s passion or purpose, we love what we do, and we do what we love.

Is that not that what we want for our children? This is not mere “fun” or just a passive form of entertainment; this is something that is complex and full of learning in all aspects of life. I watch our children with some of these games and I am literally amazed at their incredible capacity and ability of learning such complex, intrinsic games. And just like that life’s passion that we as adults find, they do not want to be pulled away from it, just as we do not. Like anyone else's work that they love, they continue thinking about it, even when they are away from it.

I have seen our children get very frustrated with a game, walk away from it, let it sit in their minds for awhile, and then return to it with a new strategy, a new perspective, and be able to do what they could not do earlier. That is satisfying work. That is confronting a challenge instead of running away from it. Speaking of challenges ~ this is one thing that I love observing in our boys, is that I notice the perseverance and determination they have ~ how they do not shy away from the challenge of the game that they love. It seems that the more and more challenging the video game gets, the more determined they are and the more they keep coming back, trusting they will learn and expand with the game.

I have watched this many a times with our boys. Anthony will be playing a Nintendo 64 game called Starfox, and he will at times become frustrated over not being able to move forward to the next level. He will shut it off for a while, come back to it later, only to find that he was able to unlock some portal within the game and has not only moved on past the level he did not before, but two or three other levels besides!

When it is a new game, our boys want to be playing it as much as possible. It becomes the immersion of learning process that I described in detail back in chapter two all over again. It is that wonder, that awe, which is what makes Life Long Learning such a blessed family connecting and bonding experience, no matter what type of family you have.

Suggestions to Expand the Video Gaming Experience

So, what to do if your child or children have a love affair with learning within the video and computer gaming genres? The same thing that you would do with whatever passion your child or children wishes to take on in their lives of learning ~ Watch them play. Join their play. Bring them treats and lunch. Talk about the game. Ask questions about the game. Talk to them about their games, about the aspects that captivate them the most, getting the view from, and being in "their world with them". By joining them in their world, you are building a bond with them and learning to see what the world looks like through their eyes.

You can even learn about the history of video gaming together. PBS has a wonderful website dedicated to the history of video gaming. It is available at the time of the writing of this book at http://www.pbs.org/kcts/videogamerevolution/. Our boys surely loved doing this together with me. They even have a quiz of sounds to see if you can guess which video gaming sound goes to which game. We got most of them right too! All but two I think if I remember. We spent quite a few hours bonding while reading, and my reminiscing with them about how the video games used to be when they first came out when I was growing up, and how far they have come in the gaming industry. Of course, Matthew and Anthony could not believe that mom was that old to have ever played the very first invented video games, but hey!

When your child(ren) have had their fill and they are ready to see what the rest of the world has to offer, you will have formed a valuable connection, and you can talk about their game with them and with others as well. Your child(ren) also will tend to be more open to something you want to suggest to do together, because it will not seem like you are just trying to get them away from the game or that you have not taken an interest in what they are learning and only doing what it is that you want to do. It will seem like you genuinely just want to spend time with them doing something great, because you have given them the gift of showing them that you do care about them, what they are learning, and what their passions and interests are.

Other ideas for making the video gaming experience more exciting still might be to buy them video game hint magazines for their games. Help them find web sites that give cheat codes and hints for their games. Invite friends over who like to play the same games with them that they do and make a video gaming party. Or maybe they might be interested in doing a project on something related to their favorite game. Eventually your child(ren) do have their fill of the games and believe me, they will. At some point, they do stop playing of their own volition, or at least start taking longer and longer breaks in between. And in between that time, enjoy the wonder of learning with them all of the games that you can, because in the game that we call life here on this earth, it is one of the most fun ways to learn!

Infinitely Universal Copyright Lifelonglearning4all.com and Dr. Patti "Diamondlady" Diamond, DD
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