Many schools have strict policies about students bringing in their potable gaming systems. Many of these policies are valid in their attempt to ensure that students are focused on their studies and not what level they are on in the first person shooter game on their PSP or DSi. There is also the concern that has been raised about the ability for these devises to take pictures of students unknowingly and then later those pictures make it to the internet. What if a classroom had their own set of portable gaming devises? Schools would have better regulations of what types of games are being played as well as the security of knowing that if a picture was taken, then devise never leaves the room. Too often, the generation of adults who are making the decisions about whether or not gaming devices should be allowed or not have never played a gaming device; their understanding is that they are evil because kids should be playing outside and not on a gaming device. The violent games give the consoles a bad rap. No one reports on the amazing educational games that the Nintendo DS has or the PSP or the XBox 360 Kinect or PS3 or the Wii. Many schools are starting to see the value of the motion detection gaming consoles, but only for physical education. The XBox 360 Kinect enables classrooms to video conference with other classrooms. I recently contacted XBox about the uses of the XBox 360 Kinect and its uses in the classroom. I was told that they are currently working on more educational games as well as networking capabilities for the Kinect because they see that schools are growing interested in its classroom application. So many students disengage at school because it has nothing to do with their world: ie gaming. The first thing that particular student does when they go home is turn on the gaming system for two hours and engage with the gaming content. Many of the students have "friends" all over the world that they play with online. We need to be tapping this valuable resource in our classrooms. The number of games that are focused on logic, puzzles, deductive reasoning, story lines, math, strategy, and memorization is staggering. Can gaming be a form of differentiation? Because this is our students' world, why not give them an educational concept and have them design (on paper) a video game concept. Have the students design the characters (attire and all), levels, puzzles, enemies, rewards, and more. You will see students go from disengaged to being the most passionate student about the content your covering. Engage students differently!!!!!!
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