Today, students’ interest with technology and its use is an all-time high. One of the most accessible technologies is computer games. Typically, the students are simply consumers of these computer games; they do not have opportunities to critically analyze the content of the games and how these games are designed. Why not help students learn important mathematics through game design?
The focus of this presentation is to help you, the middle school teacher, create exciting mathematics lessons that will engage students in research and exploration as they are designing and developing computer games. Designing and creating computer games allows students to understand and learn most challenging math concepts and skills such as rational numbers, functions, and problem solving. Research has shown that when students are challenged to design their own computer mathematics games, they learn significantly more and deeper content thus enhancing students’ academic achievement. By actively engaging the students in ‘hands-on’ activities where in technology is a means to learn the mathematics, learning becomes an authentic and personal activity. Taking advantage of students’ motivation to play educational games and to develop their own games, we can encourage and motivate them to learn challenging mathematics such as rational numbers and proportionality.
During the session, we will provide authentic examples of mathematics games designed by eight-grade students of diverse backgrounds, including ELLs. You'll then pull out your laptop, and with our help, design your own computer games. You will leave this session with basic skills in planning, developing educational games and to conduct necessary research to complete their computer game development and identify the mathematics objectives based on the Common Core.
BOYD: Please bring a laptop with you to this session! You do not need to have any programming experience or expertise to take part in this session. However,
you do need to install the free Game Maker software on your device prior to the session. We recommend doing this
before coming to MidSchoolMath as your school IT staff may need to assist.
See detailed directions here.