Quest to Learn

1. Founder Katie Salen defines game-like learning and explains how the school works  (4:51)

2. A view of Q2L through interviews with teachers, parents and students (3:43)

Description

Quest to Learn (Q2L) is a “game-like” public school in New York City. Central to its approach is innovative a theory of learning based on principles of how games work. Its structure includes 90-minute classes delivered by teachers and game designers that are framed as missions and quests with names like The Way Things Work, Codeworlds and Sports for the Mind, spliced with special activities such the one-week, school-wide, problem-solving intensives called Boss Levels, as well as community-based activities. The latest technology is deeply integrated in the curricula. It is viewed as a key facilitator of learning and a central tool that enables students to export new-found knowledge and skills into outside-of-school contexts.

 How does Q2L demonstrate CL?

Personalised/interest-powered

• Games and play are the starting point for Q2L’s pedagogical approach, these are natural areas of interest for any child.

• Students use new technologies to co-construct knowledge and express their understanding in a variety of creative formats: design, film photography, music, engineering.

• Technology gives teachers tools for differentiating curricula.

 Collaborative

• Teamwork is central to most classroom work, as students support each other to create and problem solve.

• Boss Levels, special week-long intensives in which mixed grade teams work together to solve complex problems, e.g, build a Rube Goldberg machine, require intense cross-collaboration.

• Q2L supports student collaboration with individuals, entities and communities outside of school, to leverage learning opportunities in every aspect of a student’s life.

 Authentic

• Students are encouraged to find real-world context for their new found knowledge, e.g. students prepared a health-based talk on a topic of their choice, delivered them to an audience of parents, teachers and friends, and then posted them on TEDx.

• Assignments are mostly hands-on, designed to encourage creating,  experimenting, iteration and improvement, in a process that mirrors real-world scientific and design methodology.

• Student outputs build foundational skills for contemporary media-based  professions, such as filmmaking, game design, engineering, etc.

 Academic

• The school is not about playing games, rather it is about accessing learning through gaming principles, which teach higher order skills such as systems thinking, design, creativity, and problem-solving. It meets state educational requirements.

• Traditional academic subjects are taught, but are reframed to be more descriptive of the game principles they are based on, e.g. “The Way Things Work” is actually a math and science class.

Interconnected

• Students’ learning is connected with their real lives, before, after, inside and outside of school. For example, students are asked to check their email when they wake up for a daily message, thought-starter or problem to solve. In this way, their learning begins before they even get to school and is deeply integrated in their family lives.

Equitable

• Q2L is a public school, admission is not based on test scores or economic means, despite extensive interest in the school. To apply, families must take a tour and spend time understanding the pros and cons of Q2L’s approach to find out if the curriculum is a fit for their educational philosophy and child.

 What is Q2L’s potential as a vehicle for CL?

Q2L provides a viable model for what engaged, equitable, connected education could look like, while still maintaining state academic standards. The model has already been expanded to a school in Chicago, and it runs a mobile camp in the summer. Research coming out of this program may lead to changes in practice in other public schools across the globe. Its connected philosophy teaches students principles of lifelong learning, setting them up to identify educational opportunity in informal or community-based contexts.

 What are the threats to its success?

• Q2L’s innovative nature challenges educational traditionalists (parents, teachers, administrators and officials), who may continue to confine it to the margins.

• The long terms success of this learning theory is unproven.

• Q2L(and CL) relies on the involvement and goodwill of the greater community to support its students. Continuing participation requires extra work and may not be consistently available.

• The program’s funding model is not guaranteed indefinitely; it is dependent on the philanthropy of private foundations.

• If Q2L students score low on standardized tests, the school could face pressure to dilute their approach.

• It will be difficult to keep admissions equitable as its popularity increases.

 

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