Teachers are a lot like Video Game Developers

It has been some time since I posted to this blog, but I have been busy. Transitioning to married life, getting settled in as a Special Education teacher, having to take classes to become certified to teach Special Education. It has been a whirlwind of a year, and yes, I am actually happy it is ending.

Not only am I getting my first year of teaching under my belt, but I will also be given some time to reflect on my successes and failures from this past year and work on making myself better for my students and for me.

I come back to this blog with a very specific topic to write about. As some of you who read this blog may know, there has been recent legislation pushed through the Louisiana State legislative houses at the behest of our Governor Bobby Jindal. I will make no political commentary, as I am not a politician or a political junky. If you would like to read up on the bills, here is a link.

Not long after the hullabaloo regarding Governor Jindal's education plans, there was an election held in my district for use of bonds. Three separate pieces of legislation actually. One to allocate funds to renovate and build new schools in the district, one to upgrade the technology of our district and one for a 5% teacher raise. The only of the three to pass was the first which is to be used to help our schools. I will not complain about not getting a raise, but I do wish the technology issue had passed.

Well, the reason I am writing this post is, because as I am sure you can imagine, there was a lot of heated discussion among people who lived in the district about whether this is an appropriate use of funding. One comment in particular on a friends Facebook is what struck me through this entire ordeal. The friend posted an eloquent rebuttal to the fact we did not receive our raises, stating that we as teachers will continue to provide for your students who do not have. We will continue to use our own money and resources to ensure that your students' needs are met while they are at school. To this, someone replied (in not so few words): No one asked you to.

It was this comment that struck me. No one asked you to. Our students tell this to us as well. If for instance, we prepare a arduously detailed review for an upcoming test and a particularly rowdy student is trying to win attention, we would say something like, "I worked on this for you to make sure you are ready to pass the test." and the student would simply reply, "No one asked you to."

I see this often with regard to game publishers and designers. There will be a hype train about some new feature that designers have plugged into a known franchise (or for my example, the routine of classroom activity) and then when the product is released, people will downplay it, saying it isn't anything special. They will criticize it, and encourage others not to worry with it. The designers or publishers may then become disheartened and defensive. They wills say things like, "Well, we believed that by adding this feature, it increased the enjoyability and replayability of the game. We spent several months perfecting it to get it out there to all of YOU!"

I'm sure you know where I am going with this. The public that the developers worked so hard to please, will then say, "No one asked you to." And on the flip side, say the developers and public alike believed a certain franchise is becoming stale, but still believe they have a winning formula (or in the case I'm trying to make, test results don't necessarily increase, but they also don't decrease), the developers will do nothing. And then comes the tidal wave of disgruntled public who are tired of the same old- same old and want something new or revitalizing to liven up said franchise. We come back to the previous example.

There's no way to win. There's no right or wrong, but only a delicate balance that if it teeters too far either way, you end up with dissatisfied people.  And what good is that, from either a business or educational point of view? Aren't we trying to invigorate our students to strive to learn? To work better? And isn't the point of every business model to make more money?

The Importance of Being a n00b

Hello all!

I suppose this post should have come about a week or so ago, but I am just getting around to writing it, so....there. I hope you are all having a wonderful time in school as most of us have only been back now a week. I realized the other day that I have officially been in the classroom one full year (with the exception of our holidays).  Some of you are beginning your adventure as a teacher  and I wanted to share some thoughts I had on being a new teacher, or what's called a n00b or newb or newbie in the gaming world.

The term, "n00b" is one that has been around for a few years, but has really come into the lexicon of youth here lately because of more prominent avenues and accessibility of multiplayer gaming.You may have heard this term and associated a negative connotation to it, but I refuse to see it that way. Is it partly because I've been called a n00b more than once? Maybe. But I don't think that is the only reason I look at it with a positive light.

How I came to the conclusion that being a n00b is in no way a bad thing:  Very simply, I understand that everything that lies ahead for the n00b is opportunity. You are at the very beginning of your next quest. You've worked for years to develop skills that will lend themselves to your occupation whether intentionally or unintentionally, and now you get to use those skills exactly how you choose to. As I look down the road at what lies ahead of me, all I can see is the time I can work on my craft and build myself into the educator I've always known I can be. There's not only time which I can practice what I know inside of the classroom, there is also time outside of the classroom where I can sit and reflect on everything that I've done.  To err is human, and I will err quite a lot. And I'm okay with that.

I've got nothin' but time.

I keep refreshing, but there's no new content!

Hello again all!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving for my North American audiences and for the rest of you, I hope it was a productive Thursday. It has been a while since I've updated this blog, but events in my life have been pretty intense the past few months. I don't want to bore you with details but I'm going to anyway, so sit back and enjoy. Also, because this is somewhat of a refresh for me, I will take a break from the professionalism that is usually so prevalent in my writing. You can take that seriously or not, there's really no wrong way to interpret it.

Firstly, I hope you have all been enjoying this amazing gaming fall we've been having. Seems like there has been a great new release every week for the past two months. While I personally cannot afford to purchase them all, I do feel like the collection I've gathered will keep me both entertained and frustrated for many months to come. If you're interested, here are the games I've been playing: Gears of War 3, Battlefield 3, Modern Warfare 3 and Skyrim. I haven't been able to give MW3 my full attention because I was late to the party on it, but the other three games are must buys. Especially Skyrim. If you don't play games and have no intention of playing games, you should get it anyway. That good.

On the job front, I struggled as summer closed and fall began with the fact that I had not yet found a teaching job. Here I was, this fresh-faced upstart from NWLA out to prove to the world that I'm gonna be somebody, and no one was willing to give me a chance. Well, I take that back. A few people were but I wasn't a coach so they extraneous circumstances forced them to look elsewhere. (Its the south. Football is huge. Even at the middle school level which is a little weird.)

So, I did my best to get my resume out, attempted to find a job outside of teaching (Landed an interview at this sweet non-profit in New York. Sucks I didn't get the job but I fully support what they do. Check out DoSomething.org for more.) I landed a few jobs subbing, including one three week stint as a Spanish teacher and I have no experience in Spanish. The teacher who is actually from Spain had to leave short notice for a family emergency in Spain, so there were no lesson plans or anything available once she left. So I taught myself as I went and prepared lessons like any non-Spanish speaking Spanish teacher would and toward the end of the three-week stint, I think I caught the eye of a principal at a school in Bossier and was offered a position there as  Mild-Moderate Special Education teacher. Am I SpEd certified? No. But thankfully Louisiana has this program where I can pursue SpEd certification while teaching. So that's where I am. I love my administration, love my kids. I am very happy as far as jobs go. Now, to work on the angle of SpEd and games, which I gather won't be too difficult once I've had some  more time.

Finally, if you're eyes aren't strained enough and your head isn't tired of reading, on the life front, two big changes happened literally back to back. First thing is that I married the most wonderful woman on the face of this earth. We were married on October 22, 2011. As more pictures become available to me, you better believe more will be posted here. This blog may be about gaming and teaching, but by golly its my blog so I'll post what pictures I want.

And finally, as my local readers know, my sister Heather was diagnosed with cancer back in March of this year. A very aggressive form of cancer that they believe started in her breast but quickly showed us that it wasn't afraid to move around her body and re-emerge in placed where tumors were thought to be completely extracted. Well, my beautiful, vibrant, fun-loving sister Heather lost her fight with cancer the next day. She passed at 9:15am Sunday October 23, 2011. She was 38, and we miss her very, very deeply. Excuse the cheesiness of the photo. Heather is the blonde in the back, behind me is my sister Cheryl.

There you have it, the reasons why this blog hasn't been updated as much as I would like. I look forward to updating more as I get the hang of balancing married life, a full-time teaching gig and gaming, but I can assure that it will definitely be updated more than tri-monthly. Thanks and great gaming!

Gamer:Teacher

Encouraging Gamer Students to Get Up and Get Active

Hey guys and gals!

I hope you all are having a terrific September and start of Fall! Gaming season has begun and I am sure most of your students are well aware of this. Last week saw the launch of Gears of War 3 and this week, DICE is letting loose an open beta for their game Battlefield 3. I personally can't wait as Battlefield is one of my favorite series for its innovation and design. But, one thing I would like to talk about is the reputation that people who play games often get of being overweight, junk food gobbling, sun fearing nerds. While that isn't (for the most part) true, there is definitely a correlation between being a hardcore gamer and being unhealthy. Several studies have been published and contradict one another as to whether gaming is directly linked to obesity. Some push towards an overall state of inactivity, while others claim that gaming has little to nothing to do with childhood obesity and obesity is instead caused by socioeconomic status and genealogical factors.

While I can neither claim nor disclaim any of these studies and theories, I bring to you today a great website that I recently found that urges gamers to get up, get out and get active. The name of the website is GamerFitNation. GFN touts itself as the place where gaming and health come together and they do a fantastic job at it. Started on April 6th, 2010, this website aims to help gamers become more aware of their physical and mental health and well-being. They have multiple updates daily on the latest gaming and health news and also have guest articles by Gamer MDs. Gamers can come here and look up new gamer friendly workout routines and recipes.

Now the reason why I feel we as educators should be looking at physical and mental health of our students is because when students are happy and healthy, they tend to perform better. And, as I firmly believe as a Social Studies teacher, we shouldn't only be encouraging academic growth, but also a growth in the entirety of our students character. One of my main themes here at Gamer:Teacher is character development and it is a theme I will constantly revisit because of how important I feel it is. So please take a minute and look at all that GamerFitNation has to offer our students. I know you won't be disappointed in what you find there.

Until next time-

Gamer:Teacher

Video Games Can Help Male Students

Hello all!


I hope you're enjoying your week! I was just surfing the web and came across an interesting article from Public Radio International and thought I would share it with you.


In the article titled, "Boys don't do as well as girls in school- video games can help", it starts off with the (shouldn't be) shocking statistic that in 65 countries, boys test scores in literacy is dropping compared to that of their female counterparts. The author speaks with researcher Ali Charr-Chellman who thinks that the problem isn't with boys but rather with schools: " The problem is that schools no longer welcome the competitive, physical culture of boys, and boys are getting the message that school is not for them." Charr-Chellman goes on to state that in order to better reach boys, schools should start integrating things that are interesting to them like video games. Its an interesting read for sure, and while I don't disagree with what Charr-Chellman is saying, I don't fully agree with it. Expect a post from me in the coming weeks about the gamification of society and schools. 


Here is a link to the article:  Boys don't do as well as girls in school- video games can help.


Until next time!


Gamer:Teacher

NPCs: Most Pleasantly Ignored

Hello all!

For many of you, today is the first day of school and I would like to firstly wish you the best of luck on your new school year! It is going to be exciting and renewing and at some times disappointing, but at all times rewarding.

Today's blogpost is taken from an issue I've seen growing considerably in my PLN (Personal Learning Network- Learn more here). That issue is of Critical Thinking. Are we teaching students valuable enough critical thinking skills? Or are we instead feeding them all of the information and expecting them to digest it and regurgitate it back to us? Well, me being the hyper-intellectual that I am (humor) have found a parallel in the gaming world. That parallel friends, is the NPC.

The NPC or non-playable character is often filler for the game. The player takes control of their character and runs around causing havoc or saving the day while the NPCs are randomly loaded, unloaded and re-loaded onto the screen with minimal action or dialogue. They are typically being run over, hit, kicked or most pleasantly, ignored by the player.

You may ask yourself, "Self, how does this equate to learners and education?" and I would tell you to A. Stop talking to yourself and B. quite simply, when learners aren't given tasks that test and exasperate their skills and are instead spoon fed information for, I don't know, say a huge standardized test, how are they any better than these NPCs? Learners are given set parameters which they are not to exceed for fear that we as teachers will be uncomfortable and that then robs the students of developing these important skills. Teacher your students to take the reigns, teach them to ask questions. Facilitate their learning and for once do not be the sage on the stage, but instead the guide on the side. Learning should be messy, so let's all get dirty together and teach students how to test limits. Teach them how to break the mold of what we expect and instead teach themselves how to reach.

Go here for 10 tips to encourage critical thinking among students: Edutopia

Find me on Twitter and expand your PLN: @chopork

Character Classes and Your Students.

Hello all!

Well, school has officially begun here in my home district, and many of you are counting down the days until you're back in the classroom. A lot of excitement and honestly, fear about what this next year will bring is surely swirling around in your brain! If you're a new teacher, like me, you may wonder how you'll do in your first classroom, how seriously the students will take you, what the parents will be like. And if you're a vet teacher, you're probably checking and re-checking lesson plans and looking at student performance from last year. All of this is great and I'm excited for all of you to go into your first classroom or return to your classroom. However, what I'd like to talk about today is character.

More specifically, what kind of character are you preparing your students to become So much outside pressure and influence now pervades the school halls that its hard to know if and how you yourself as the teacher are influencing your students. And yes, this is a teaching AND gaming blog, so let me get to the base of what I'm speaking about: Character classes.

In video games, and many card and board based games, you are invited to take upon yourself a "Character class." What this dictates are certain characteristics and abilities you are in possession of if you play that character. Most often you find these in RPG based games, but more and more these principals are sneaking their way into multiplayer centric games. In games, you set your character up with specific load-outs to ensure that you are prepared for any "battle" situation. In RPGs, you may find yourself playing as a Mage, Soldier, or Assassin. In multiplayer games, its more gun oriented: Sniper, Assault or Close-Quarters Combat.

How does this lend itself to classroom instruction? Well, that's kind of up to you. How are you preparing your students for school and life situations? Are you preparing them to handle these situations from a distance as a Mage or Sniper would? Are you preparing them to rush into the fire like an Assassin or Close Quarters Combat soldier would? (I understand assassin's are stealthy--For the sake of argument, you win. But stick with me!) Or are you preparing your students to be more middle of the road when it comes to obstacles? Neither this, nor that but prepared nonetheless.

The middle school I am currently subbing has implemented this new program called "advisory". In this program, the students come to their homeroom teacher for 30 minutes once a week to discuss what is going on in their lives and at school as well as any additional pressures they may be facing. We as teachers can take this time to speak to students either as a group or give them individualized attention. It is a pretty great program that I hope the students can appreciate.

Until next time-

Gamer:Teacher

This isn't a topic that can easily be covered in one post, so I hope to continue talking about character on this blog. As brief as this was, I hope it gives some idea as to how students are being prepared for the real world.