The RPG effect

Hello all, and welcome to another exciting post of Gamer:Teacher! Last week was full of happy and disappointing surprises. Most of which non-school related so I won't burden you with those details. On the bright side, I have been able to get some great gaming in as a stress relief/coping mechanism (sound so depressing when you say it like that). Among that, was an XBox Live Arcade game titled Bastion. In this game, you take your character through beautifully painted environments on a traditional RPG tale. Boy wakes up, he's the only one still in his town, no one met at the emergency spot AKA the Bastion, boys journey is to collect pieces to reopen the Bastion to find his people. Cut and dry story. But what really grabbed me about this story was how the boys actions were reacted TO by the narrator. Instead of the narrator ( who we later find is called simply "Stranger") voicing the story and the actions the boy WILL take, the narrator instead outlines what options are available and then reacts to the decisions the player makes.

For example, as I explored the first world, I would often stray from the path I was supposed to take to instead explore various other outlets. The narrator would then say things like, "The boy then walked around for a bit" or when I would destroy the blockades that weren't necessary to my path, the narrator would say, "The boy rampaged," While playing the game, I thought this was so novel and genuine. The designer of the game was interested in how the player wanted to play the game instead of telling the player where to go and how to handle situations. Then I thought, "Why aren't more classrooms like this?" Yes, you are seeing this as more teachers embrace Bloom's Taxonomy and Higher Order Thinking strategies, but not at a rate that reaches the most students. Its like that wonderful saying, "A teacher should be a guide on the side and not the sage on a stage."

We as educators shouldn't be telling students where to go and what to do with their education (Understand I am not saying that the students should have free-reign over the classroom).  We should be designing pathways for our students to take that allow them to stray from the main path we have placed for them. We should expect that students want to explore and engage their education their own way. We should let them leave their desks at the risk of them falling, but know that we can always provide them an extra life.

Well, that about sums it up. I hope you've had your fill of me this week (and parenthetical statements). Until next time-

Gamer:Teacher