For the week 6 activity, I reviewed: Business English Games for ESL
http://www.businessenglishpod.com/2010/02/28/get-motivated-with-esl-business-english-games/
A summary of the different points in relation to my own context are as follows:
1. Integration
The game certainly integrates learning with pay in it’s game show format, but seems perhaps a little unbalanced (more about play than learning). The game claims to be a “business English games for ESL.”Not to be overly critical, but I have a hard time seeing idioms as of critical importance in relation ESL learning for business. For me falls perhaps under edutainment.
2. Motivation & Think About Your Audience
The game is intrinsically motivating with continuous challenge, has elements of surprise in the questions as well as, rewards systems, consequences, and rapid feedback. A flash game it does not have tacit feedback. The repetition is made special by the format of a popular rewards-based game show with suspenseful time limits and rewards.
3. Choose Your Game Wisely and Find it in the Content
This game covers a minor topic in relation to business ESL (idioms) which are somewhat anecdotal. There isn’t much scaffolding provided to actually make these useful in different business situations, it focuses more on getting quotes themselves right. The ability to recite Nietzsche correctly at a board meeting is not necessarily going to make a business ESL student accel at his or her career goals so I’m a bit befuddled at the usefulness of the games title in relation to this.
4. Think Small; Don’t Be Overly Ambitious
The game does think small in it’s focus and cover it fairly tightly. The cognitive format of this particular game show suits the learning of idioms rather well. The scale and complexity is manageable and useful and mastery is supported with suitable puzzles and points and there are three different levels provided (expert, advanced and novice). The system relationship between these is clear. .
5. Learning & Mastery
The game itself is simple and quick to engage with and play. Features are simple enough to not need explanation, and goals, progress, and incentives are clear.
6. Soft Skills of 21st Century are Connected with Content
Soft skills involved are looking up and rehearsing idioms for motivation in business. As one would likely use search engines for unknown idioms this does to some degree support 21st centry skills along with critical process of elimination. These are however fairly basic skills so I can’t say they would have a large applied impact outside of the game.
7. Push Beyond the Curriculum Standards
I don’t see this game as pushing the frontiers of knowledge or redefining new learning, rather it reinforces old practices.
8. Flexible and Adaptive
I see this game as lacking much iterative potential. It is not very adaptable but rather right/wrong. There are different paths enabled in a small way by the choice of which categories to approach first.
9. Cost & Low/ Right Technology
This game is in my opinion more entertainment than education so it is reduced in aesthetics. Although it is free I believe it’s novelty and therefore usefulness would wear thin.
10. 3 Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
I think that “open” education games (OEG?) would be a wonderful idea and resource for game players and makers alike. This would support a more iterative and innovative model of game development. It would also make better use of digital rip/mix/burn culture in order to support the three R’s mentioned!
I’d give it 2 or possibly 3 stars at the most in terms of rating.
Final reflection:
Overall, I don’t see this game as a strong example for mobile game learning. It was a great example for evaluating these different properties though! It could have provided a better balance of game vs learning and also provided better scaffolding, better adaptability, and better future applicability and remix-ability.
Thank you Bobbi for a great overview. Would you add/remove any criteria from the list when evaluating MLearning games?
You’re most welcome. That’s a tough but terrific question Ana, I think your criteria list looks really great as is. The only perspective I might add if anything would be focus, as defined here: http://elearnmag.acm.org/archive.cfm?aid=1943210
Your groups presentation is actually really timely in relation to my ETEC 532 class where we’re looking at gaming in education. I’m enjoying the week in both classes much more as a result, so thanks for the timely topic!
There’s some interesting views on successful educational gaming in a few of our 532 readings that don’t pertain to mobile learning specifically but might be useful resources in relation to your mobile OER? They are available at the UBC library online. In particular:
– “The instructional context that envelops gaming is a more important predictor of learning than the game itself.” (Anetta, 2008).
– “Students are more likely to achieve if attempts are made to make the learning environment more congruent with that preferred by students” (2008).
– There should be “no overt teaching involved” (Anetta, 2008)
– “Design the task and the learning environment to reflect the complexity of the the environment they should be able to function in at the end of learning” (Dekanter, 2005).
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1. Annetta, L., A. (2008). Video games in education: Why they should be used and how they are being used. ‘Theory Into Practice’, 47(3), 229-239.
2. DeKanter, N. (2005). Gaming Redefines Interactivity for Learning. TechTrends 49(3), 26-31
Thank you, Bobbi. Your input is much appreciated and interestingly enough focus was listed in o ur original list and then I took it out as the list was getting too long. We will be integrating your insights in our OER.
Thank you!
Hi Bobbi!
Thanks for the great review on Business English Games for ESL! I have to agree that it’s not a strong example in the mobile game-learning world. The Anetta 2008 reading from our other course is very applicable in a sense of motivation and building problem solving skills and enhancing strategic learning. Thanks!
Hi Bobbi,
Thanks for your great overview of this particular Business for ESL game. In your integration, you mentioned that you may not see the impact of “idioms” being important. A great point, I tried using this program with my ELL learners and it was great practice for some of the intermediate ELL learners. Idioms are important for them to learn but yes not necessarily a critical component of business learning but a great integration of language learning and idioms are part of the curriculum in their understanding of various idioms in general.
I like that you mentioned that the game in particular does not demonstrate any new learning but does help them practice previous skill sets. A good review so to speak and many ELL learners in my experience love the competitive aspect of Jeopardy. I am particularly interested in new learning games for ELLs as I teach varying classes of ELLs for numerous subjects and am always looking for more interative games for them. This was a good quick warm-up for students to get their minds started on the specific lesson on hand.
Thank you for sharing in our GBL activities and thoughts we can integrate into our OER! Wonderful thoughtful points. I too am in your other course and enjoying the integration of our weekly discussions with our own GBL OER project.
Ah, that makes much more sense, thanks for clarifying Leah. 🙂
I tried to be objective when considering the particular aims of the game, but it was hard when I don’t have any experience with ESL or ELL teaching/learning. It’s nice to hear your input on this as having had experience with it! The list is amazing by the way, I think it is a fantastic analytic tool for educators to be more critical in assessing GBL. It seems much needed, and I’m sure I’ll be sharing the site link with others.
Hi Bobbi,
You are very welcome! Thanks for your review, always looking for new resources for ELL and ESL learners! so appreciate your addition. I do find that as an educator, there are so many tools and resources out there that we can use but they can’t all cater to our every need so we need to use them where we can or at least for scaffolding, warm-ups, some interaction, collaboration or at least for something different we can try with our students. Was happy to see your review to try something new with the students. Thank you!
Cheers