Games & Education

            The Educational Online Game assignment had me and my fellow group members focus on one online educational game, analyze it, and present it to the class. It was an interesting assignment that allowed me to look further into the benefits of using games to teach. I have not created many rubrics so far, and trying to make one for an online game was certainly a different experience. I struggled a bit with defining the categories of the rubric, what constituted a good score in areas such as visuals, feedback, and educational value, because I have never thought about using games seriously in my future classroom. However, with the references given to the class, my group and I were able to determine our standards and requirements to put into our rubric, and I think I now have a better understanding of what to look for in a game that I would to use in the future.

            The game that my group decided on was “Treefrog Treasure,” a free platformer game that helped in reinforcing and reviewing certain mathematics processes, such as fractions, decimals, and other number line concepts. It was fairly simple in its directions and gameplay, so that helped in our decision to focus on this game. Although it may not be an original subject for an educational game, I believe its simplicity can still greatly benefit students. According to Jameson (2014), many young children can develop math anxiety, where one starts to avoid exposing themselves to mathematics, and there are “several correlates of math anxiety, such as high test anxiety, low enjoyment of math, low self-confidence in math, lack of motivation toward math..." (p. 519). Thus, I believe that a game such as “Treefrog Treasure” can help in dispelling math anxiety, as it provides an easy and enjoyable method of practicing math that can boost self-confidence.

            Although I plan to teach high school-level ESL classes, I can still see the advantages of this game. I may not be able to use it in my future classes specifically, but as said earlier, it can help younger children from developing math anxiety. Also, it can also help students with disabilities who struggle with mathematics. Crawford, Higgins, Huscroft-D’Angelo, and Hall (2016) conducted research on the benefits that electronic tools for students with disabilities, and they stated that “in mathematics, ESTs [electronic support tools] can reduce differences in achievement gains, and differences in achievement gains help define the achievement gap" (p. 1178). Being an online educational game, “Treefrog Treasure” can be considered as an EST, so it can definitely be helpful to disabled students, as well.

            To present our game, my group chose to use Canva. None of us had used it before, but we wanted to try something different and new, especially compared to the tools used by other groups in our class. It was a bit challenging at first to become used to Canva, but we eventually adapted to it and made our presentation. We also used Google Docs for most of our note-taking, though we tried using Google Keep sometimes. But the former proved to be more efficient for us. We also used Kahoot to create our interactive quiz at the end of the presentation to enhance our audience participation. In future group projects, I hope to expand and try out different tools and technology to effectively communicate and complete assignments.

           

References

Crawford, L., Higgins, K., Huscroft-D’Angelo, J., & Hall, L. (2016). Students’ use of electronic support tools in mathematics. Educational Technology Research & Development, 64(6), 1163-1182.

Jameson, M. M. (2014). Contextual factors related to math anxiety in second-grade children. Journal of Experimental Education, 82(4), 518-536.

Video Sample of "Treefrog Treasure" Gameplay: